Fellini's first film with international distribution, "I Vitelloni" did reasonable box office in Britain and North America while performing "huge in Argentina". Opening in France on 23 April 1954, it was especially well received. André Martin of "Les Cahiers du Cinéma" insisted that by "virtue of the quality of the narrative, and the balance and control of the film as a whole, "I Vitelloni" is neither commercial nor does it possess those traits that usually permit a work of art to be consecrated and defined. With a surprising and effective sense of cinema, Fellini endows his characters with a life both simple and real". Film critic Geneviève Agel appreciated the maestro's symbolism: "Fellini films a deserted piazza at nighttime. It symbolizes solitude, the emptiness that follows communal joy, the bleak torpor that succeeds the swarming crowd; there are always papers lying around like so many reminders of what the day and life have left behind."