Trivia

According to Variety, Emilio Estevez was far down the list of actors in consideration for the role of Frank Wyatt. The trade paper story explained that the studio's desperation to quickly cast the lead role also led to Estevez taking a much higher-than-expected payday. Actors who passed included Tom Cruise, John Travolta, and Christian Slater.

During the filming of the rooftop confrontation between Fallon and Ray the cast and crew were stunned by the sound of a random, unexpected gunshot. The crew ran downstairs to find a 16-year-old kid with his head blown-off by another youth of the same age as part of a gang initiation by murder. The army was brought in to secure the area the next day and production was moved elsewhere.

Emilio Estevez asked for and received $4 million to star in the film. He was able to get a much larger payday than anyone expected because he was available at a point where the film needed to either go into production or have the plug pulled, and they had spent more than twice that $4 million figure on pre-production which would have been lost if he hadn't taken the lead role.

Progressive metal band Tool and rap rock group Rage Against the Machine recorded a song for the movie's soundtrack, which they were not pleased with. They ended up scrapping the track, which hasn't been given an official title, but it is usually referred to as "Revolution" or "You Can't Kill The Revolution". The song was leaked on the internet and can be found on SoundCloud, and the song lasts nearly eight minutes, and the song is very slow and the vocal duties alternate between Maynard James Keenan and Zack De La Rocha.

During the opening weekend there was a shooting at a screening in a Bronx theatre and local media blamed the movie itself for the incident. In response, it was quickly pulled from distribution and ran for only two weeks, this led to its failure at the box office and eventual cult status.