 The Man from London premiered in competition at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival , Tarr 's first film to do so . Although its showing was highly anticipated , the slow pace and prolonged shots of the film " had the press fleeing like panicked slaughterhouse cattle " as The New York Times put it , and it won no prize . This failure was attributed by the film 's French distributor Shellac to its late showing and the poor quality of the dubbing . A proposal for the film to open the Hungarian Film Week out of competition had previously been rejected by the festival 's board . Following its Cannes appearance , the film was screened at the film festivals of Toronto , Melbourne , Edinburgh , Split , Vancouver and New York . It proved controversial in New York , where elements of the audience reacted favourably when the film appeared to end prematurely due to a technical fault ; others greeted the actual conclusion with fervent applause and calls of bravo . 
