With over 4 million people in Korea having watched the film, the demand for legislative reform eventually reached its way to the National Assembly of South Korea, where a revised bill, dubbed the Dogani Bill, was passed in late October 2011 to abolish the statute of limitations for sex crimes against minors and the disabled.
Based on the novel The Crucible by Gong Ji-young, Silenced is based on real-life events at a school for the deaf.
Movie adaptation was first conceived by main actor Gong Yoo. While serving in the military, Gong Yoo read the novel and thought it should be made into a movie. When Gong Yoo got vacation time from the military he sought out the novel's writer Kong Ji-Young & asked if the novel could be made into a movie. Kong Ji-Young stated on her first meeting with Gong Yoo, he mentioned he wanted to make a movie version for underprivileged kids.
Despite common misconception the child actors were never actually present in the disturbing scenes they were edited in later and they acted by themselves as did the adults. no adult ever touched a kid on set and the parents of the kids were on set at all times to make sure of this.
The woman that played Min-Soo's grandmother is the actual grandmother of movie director Hwang Dong-Hyuk.