During shooting, when Shyamalan was apparently challenged by making his first film, a member of the Indian sound crew told him that he reminded him of Steven Spielberg when he went to India to shoot Close Encounters of the Third Kind. This gave the director energy to continue.
The film never received a wide release for mainstream distribution and has been shown primarily at film festivals. Praying with Anger screened at the 1993 AFI Fest, where it won the "First Film Competition" for American independent filmmakers.