While the movie was being made Richard Zanuck was fired as head of production and was replaced by Elmo Williams. Williams said "Seven Minutes" was "going to be a very interesting film. I was worried after the first cut but Russ handled the sex extremely well. When I saw the first half I was going to ask him to slow the picture down. And it's rare for me to ask a guy to slow a picture down. I mean, so people could understand the story better. But when I saw the whole film with the second half – the trial – I understood what he was doing...I've never seen a good trial in a film – a trial that isn't slow, isn't boring."