According to Stellan Skarsgård, the "chocolate sweets" portion of the first chapter is based on an anecdote told by a female friend of Lars von Trier about how she and a friend dared each other to have sex with people on a train for a bag of candy.
In the scene in Chapter Two where Joe compares her genitalia to automatic doors, some archive footage of leaves blowing towards a set of automatic doors is shown. This footage is from Lars Von Trier's series "The Kingdom".
Even though the film has not indicate the year, the mise en scène places the story in the early 1970s.Some cars that weren't in the production until the mid-1980s were visible in the parallel parking scene: Rover 800 (production started in 1986), third-generation Audi 100 (1982-1991), Volvo 245 (updated taillamps from 1981 onward), and second-generation Volkswagen Jetta (1984-1992).The type of external rear-view mirrors and bumpers on Jaguar XJ driven by Jerôme (Shia LeBeouf) indicates a Series III (1979-1992) while the period-correct Jaguar XJ (Series I or II) should have chrome mirrors and bumpers.
When Joe parks Jerome's Jaguar (after Jerome failing to do so), the shot from the outside shows that the car is parked between two other cars, one in front and one behind theirs. When however, the shot changes to the back seat towards the front, we see that there is no car in front, just empty road.
The action is supposed to take place in England. But Joes' Apartment has European style electrical outlets on the walls, as does the hospital room where she visits her father.