The film caused controversy when it premiered as the opening film of the 2001 Venice Film Festival. A number of critics accused Manchevski of having a political agenda and using the film to express it. The Evening Standard critic Alexander Walker claimed the film was portraying the Turkish army in a bad light and even called it racist. Several other critics saw the film as taking sides in the current armed conflict in Macedonia, in spite of the fact that the film was filmed before the hostilities began. Charges were nevertheless leveled that Manchevski's film was anti-Moslem, anti-Albanian and anti-Turkish. He did not respond to the accusations in Venice, presumably hoping the film would speak for itself. He, however, did respond later, explaining that the film is even-handed in its portrayal of brutal killers – it does not spare the Macedonians, Albanians, Turks, Greeks – or the Americans, for that matter. Even though the reviews (and even some of the original reviewers) were much more favorable and nuanced once the film moved from Venice to the regular theaters, the damage was done, and Dust never achieved the wide distribution expected from the follow-up to the phenomenally successful Before the Rain.
