After many years of intense investigation, there is still no actual proof that real snuff films even exist or, indeed, have ever existed. With this in mind, opportunistic co-producer Allan Shackleton saw the chance to make a quick buck. He took an Argentinian low budget biker film titled The Slaughter (1971), changed its title to "Snuff", removed all of its credits and added a 10-minute epilogue to it that showed the supposed director of "The Slaughter" finish making the film and suddenly attack one of its female cast members, then kill and disembowel her, all the while being surreptitiously filmed by a cameraman. This footage was then passed off as real, even though the atrocious acting and sub-par special effects clearly showed that it was phony. Nevertheless, ever the entrepreneur, Shackleton arranged a public showing of the film in Times Square, NY, told the New York Police Department what was about to be shown there and set up a small group of phony "protesters". The publicity stunt worked; "Snuff" made over $300,000 in three weeks.
The film's co-director, Michael Findlay, was later killed in a horrible accident on top of the Pan Am Building when a helicopter landed badly, tipped over on its side, and killed him and others when they were hit by the spinning helicopter propeller blades.
The simulated murder scene of a female cast member at the end of the film was shot in the New York production studio of pornography film director Carter Stevens.
The film's final scene, which showed the simulated murder of a female cast member, was shot much later than the rest of it at the behest of its distributor.
The voice of "Carmela" was dubbed into English for the film by its cinematographer Roberta Findlay and is uncredited. The Carmela character is in archive footage from the original version of the film, The Slaughter (1971).