text: Initial reception The film won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and was nominated for three Academy Awards (in non-consecutive years, a unique achievement): Best Foreign Language Film in 1966, and Best Screenplay (Gillo Pontecorvo and Franco Solinas) and Best Director (Gillo Pontecorvo) in 1968. Other awards include the City of Venice Cinema Prize (1966), the International Critics Award (1966), the City of Imola Prize (1966), the Italian Silver Ribbon Prize (director, photography, producer), the Ajace Prize of the Cinema d'Essai (1967), the Italian Golden Asphodel (1966), Diosa de Plata at the Acapulco Film Festival (1966), the Golden Grolla (1966), the Riccione Prize (1966), Best Film of 1967 by Cuban critics (in a poll sponsored by Cuban magazine Cine), and the United Churches of America Prize (1967).
  Given national divisions over the Algerian War, The Battle of Algiers generated considerable political controversy in France. It was one of the first films to directly confront the issue of French imperialism that reached the French Métropole; earlier films like Godard's Le petit soldat had only addressed such matters in passing. Its initial festival screenings sparked nearly unanimous backlash among French critics. At the Venice Film Festival, the delegation of French journalists refused to attend the film's screening and abandoned the festival altogether when it received the Golden Lion. Despite the high international acclaim, the national press and film industry united in opposition to the idea of releasing the film in French cinemas.