Those are real worms Christian Bale is eating.

In a show of solidarity, as many of his actors lost weight for their roles, the director lost almost 30 pounds.

Dieter Dengler was captured not once but twice in real life. The scene where he was captured while drinking from a river is based on his second capture.

Jeremy Davies lost 33 pounds for his role.

Christian Bale lost 55 pounds for his role.

The film was shot in reverse continuity so Christian Bale, having worked hard to lose weight for the role, would appear the gauntest at the end, and then could simply gain the pounds back over the course of filming, working backwards through time so that when Bale returned to his average weight he would be filming his scenes as Dengler prior to being taken prisoner.

All the guards in the POW camp were based on true characters from Dieter Dengler's story except for 'Walkie Talkie' who is a fictional creation of the director.

Steve Zahn lost 40 pounds for his role.

According to Steve Zahn, there were no trailers for the cast and crew on set.

At nearly $5.5 million dollars in the United States, this is the highest grossing film to date (March 2008) for Werner Herzog (his films have generally played in art-houses in the US).

To prepare for his role, Jeremy Davies read the book "Man's Search for Meaning" by Viktor Frankl. Frankl was a psychiatrist and a Holocaust survivor who wrote about the psychological reactions experienced by prisoners.

Based on the true story of Dieter Dengler, a US Naval Aviator shot down over Laos during the Vietnam War.

Stuntman Chris Carnel burnt his face in a scene depicting Dengler's plane crash.

The plane crash scene is the only scene where Christian Bale was doubled by a stuntman.

There is an aircraft decal of a boy flying using a umbrella on the outside of Dieter's cockpit. This is a reference to a German children book story of a flying Robert who, in spite of the advice of his parents dared to go out into the storm. The storm carries him away and they never find him again.

In the POW camp where Dieter Dengler was held, there were altogether 7 POWs. For story-telling purposes, this was cut down to 6. This is explained by Werner Herzog in his commentary.

Matt Damon was the original choice to play the lead role but ultimately turned it down and Christian Bale was cast instead.

Based on Werner Herzog's documentary Flucht aus Laos (1997).

Shot in 44 days, including the different locations and stunt scenes.

When Dieter (Christian Bale) is asked about how he became a Naval Aviator, he describes an awesome experience of seeing a fighter plane flying by very close when he was a child in wartime Germany. The experience described is strikingly similar to what Bale's character Jim had nineteen years before in Das Reich der Sonne (1987).

To show how powerless a man would feel once having been captured, the director insisted that whilst being held prisoner, everyone who was right handed must predomantly use their left hand, and everyone who was left handed must use their right. In some scenes this enormously confused Bale, but the director reassured him that everyone was confused.

First cut was almost 3 hours.

Herzog's film is starkly at odds with Dieter Dengler's own book "Escape From Laos," and Dengler's statements in the documentary Flucht aus Laos (1997), when it comes to the character of Gene DeBruin. The real Gene DeBruin (played in the movie by Jeremy Davies) was spoken of highly by Dengler: He described DeBruin as a strong leader and peacemaker when differences threatened their escape plan. Phisit Indradat - the last living survivor of the camp - called DeBruin "The finest man I have ever met." He believes that Dengler would be appalled by Rescue Dawn (2006), had he lived to see it, because of the character assassination of Gene Deburin. Indradat had high praise for the filming location but otherwise he said it technically showed a great lack of research. Indradat and DeBruin's family repeatedly tried to reach out to Herzog in pre-production to get a balanced representation of the events, but no one could reach him. Key events in "Rescue Dawn" that present Dengler as the mastermind, were in fact the work of DeBruin, who spent 2.5 years in the prison before Dengler arrived. He and fellow prisoners spent that time formulating an escape plane and storing rice in bamboo tubes in preparation. In the movie version, DeBruin is not only against any escape, but it is Dengler who comes up with the idea to store rice in the tubes (and DeBruin who tries to eat it beforehand). According to Dieter Dengler it was DeBruin who got the important nail, long before Dengler even arrived. And DeBruin was part of the attack on the guards, not a no-show like in the film. Debruin chose to stay back and care for a sick POW, who was not able to escape with the others through the jungle. This heroic, selfless act lead ultimately to his death. Herzog's screenplay and Davies' performance made basically a 'movie villain' out of the real-life hero DeBruin, but still used his real name in a movie, that claims to be based on fact. Herzog apparently regretted this misrepresentation later.