There were no picture cars utilized during principal photography. All period vehicles seen in the film are digital.
The setting of the film is Little Tokyo, in 1935 Los Angeles. However, most of present day Little Tokyo looks dramatically different, with many modern buildings. Only certain interior scenes were filmed in Little Tokyo. Key exterior scenes were actually shot in an area that was originally part of Los Angeles' Chinatown, and were enhanced digitally to appear to be geographically situated where Little Tokyo is located (with the famous City Hall tower in the background).
For the assassination attempt on Sei Fujii (Chris Tashima), it was originally scripted that Hawaiian Hoodlum would strangle Fujii with the rope. However, due to a scheduling conflict during filming, Garret Sato was unavailable to shoot the scene. To stay on schedule, director Jeffrey Gee Chin decided to have lead gangster Yamada (Ikuma Ando) do the strangling instead - which, in the end, made for a dramatic head-to-head encounter.
The film garnered its first award before it was even finished: Pacific Citizen newspaper honored actor Chris Tashima, director Jeffrey Gee Chin and executive producer Fumiko Carole Fujita, with their Extraordinary APAs (Asian Pacific Americans) Award, for work on this film, in March of 2012 - six months before completion.