Despite the film's eventual lionization by film scholars, the film received a harsh reception at its opening in May at the 1960 Cannes Film Festival. It is one of the festival's more notorious reactions. According to Vitti, "the screening of Cannes was a real-life drama." From the opening titles, despite the film's serious tone, laughs erupted in a dark theater packed with critics and photographers. Laughs continued through the runtime, joined by boos. Gene Youngblood stated that audience members usually booed during long sequences where nothing happened to further the film's plot, but has asserted that "quite a lot is happening in these scenes." Antonioni and Vitti, who claimed she was sobbing, fled the theater.