Rachel Ward and Bryan Brown are husband and wife in real life. This marks their fourth on-screen collaboration.
Bill Hunter who stars as the PM of Australia, was in the original On the Beach (1959) as an uncredited swimming double. Bill claimed that on this film he was inspired to take up acting after watching one of the leads (variously claimed to be either Gregory Peck or Fred Astaire) do 27 takes of a scene, and thinking he could do better.
The Los Angeles class submarine in this movie uses a "caterpillar" (silent) drive as was used by the Soviet submarine Red October in The Hunt for Red October (1990).
The "caterpillar drive" for nuclear submarines exists only in the imaginations of author Tom Clancy (from "Hunt for Red October") and the screenwriters of the Australian remake of On the Beach (2000).