The film premiered at the 15th Venice International Film Festival on 6 September 1954 and won the Silver Lion. It was released in Italy on 22 September 1954, and in the United States on 16 July 1956. In 1994 a re-mastered print was financed by filmmaker Martin Scorsese, who has acknowledged that since childhood he has related to the character of Zampanò, bringing elements of the self-destructive brute into his films "Taxi Driver" and "Raging Bull". Janus Films is the current distributor of the film on video.