New York City 1972 Commercial Releases
(Reconstructed from New York Times archives; I didn't start keeping track week-to-week until 1998. List is probably not definitive—if it got neither an ad nor a review, I won't have caught it—but everything major should be here. Films seen by yours truly are in blue.)
Week of 29 Dec
Dr. Phibes Rises Again (Robert Fuest)Visual Alchemy (various)
Week of 22 Dec
Across 110th Street (Barry Shear)Black Gunn (Robert Hartford-Davis)
Cries and Whispers (Ingmar Bergman)
The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds (Paul Newman)
The Getaway (Sam Peckinpah)
Hit Man (George Armitage)
Jeremiah Johnson (Sydney Pollack)
The Last House on the Left (Wes Craven)
The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (John Huston)
Necromancy (Bert I. Gordon)
Prince Igor (Roman Tikhomirov) [1969]
Up the Sandbox (Irvin Kershner)
Week of 15 Dec
Avanti! (Billy Wilder)Cesar and Rosalie (Claude Sautet)
Child's Play (Sidney Lumet)
The Heartbreak Kid (Elaine May)
Here Comes Every Body (John Whitmore)
Images (Robert Altman)
Man of La Mancha (Arthur Hiller)
Pete 'n' Tillie (Martin Ritt)
The Poseidon Adventure (Ronald Neame)
Teenage Sex Report (Ernst Hofbauer)
Traffic (Jacques Tati)
Travels With My Aunt (George Cukor)
Week of 8 Dec
Love Under 17 (R.B. Winston)Moonwalk One (Theo Kamecke)
School Girls Growing Up (Walter Boos & Ernest Hofbauer)
The Sensuous Teenager (Max Pécas)
Sleuth (Joseph L. Mankiewicz)
Week of 1 Dec
...And Hope to Die (René Clément)Crescendo (Alan Gibson)
Dracula A.D. 1972 (Alan Gibson)
Eat the Document (Bob Dylan)
The Swingin' Pussycats (Alexis Neve) [1969]
Week of 24 Nov
Belated Flowers (Abram Room)Four Nights of a Dreamer (Robert Bresson)
Honey Comb (Carlos Saura) [1969]
Rage (George C. Scott)
Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny (R. Winer)
They Only Kill Their Masters (James Goldstone)
Week of 17 Nov
Asylum (Roy Ward Baker)The Mechanic (Michael Winner)
Ulzana's Raid (Robert Aldrich)
Week of 10 Nov
Black Girl (Ossie Davis)Cactus in the Snow (Martin Zweibach)
The Great Waltz (Andrew L. Stone)
L'amour fou (Jacques Rivette) [1969]
Savage Messiah (Ken Russell)
1776 (Peter H. Hunt)
Week of 3 Nov
Escape to the Sun (Menahem Golan)Trouble Man (Ivan Dixon)
The Twelve Chairs (Leonid Gaidai)
The Valachi Papers (Terence Young)
Why (Nanni Loy)
Week of 27 Oct
The Deadly Trap (René Clément)Farewell Uncle Tom (Gualtiero Jacopetti & Franco Prosperi)
Play It as It Lays (Frank Perry)
Suburban Wives (Derek Ford)
Toys Are Not for Children (Stanley H. Brasloff)
Week of 20 Oct
The Assassination of Trotsky (Joseph Losey)Black Fantasy (Lionel Rogosin)
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Luis Buñuel)
The House of Missing Girls (Jean-François Davy) [1969]
Lady Sings the Blues (Sidney J. Furie)
The Man From Room 3 (Leon Jeannot) [1969]
Oh! Calcutta! (Guillaume Martin Aucoin & Jacques Levy)
Son of Blob (Larry Hagman)
When the Legends Die (Stuart Millar)
You'll Like My Mother (Lamont Johnson)
Week of 13 Oct
Bad Company (Robert Benton)Bonnie's Kids (Arthur Marks)
Born Black (Rolf von Sydow) [1969]
Countess Dracula (Peter Sasdy)
Fellini's Roma (Federico Fellini)
The King of Marvin Gardens (Bob Rafelson)
The Secretary (William Diehl, Jr.)
Two English Girls (François Truffaut)
Vampire Circus (Robert Young)
Young Winston (Richard Attenborough)
Week of 6 Oct
Heat (Paul Morrissey)Love, Swedish Style (Maurice Smith)
Night of the Lepus (William F. Claxton)
A Sense of Loss (Marcel Ophuls)
Stanley (William Grefé)
Wednesday's Child* (Kenneth Loach)
* Better known today as Family Life
Week of 29 Sep
Chloe in the Afternoon (Eric Rohmer)Four Times That Night (Mario Bava)
A Separate Peace (Larry Peerce)
Where Does It Hurt? (Rod Amateau)
Week of 22 Sep
Cancel My Reservation (Paul Bogart)The Doberman Gang (Byron Ross Chudnow)
Dulcima (Frank Nesbitt)
The Emigrants (Jan Troell)
Hammer (Bruce Clark)
Hickey & Boggs (Robert Culp)
Rough Magic (Timothy Knox)
Sounder (Martin Ritt)
The Swingin' Stewardesses (Michael Thomas)
Week of 15 Sep
The Case of the Naves Brothers (Luís Sérgio Person) [1967]The Ruling Class (Peter Medak)
Week of 8 Sep
[no films released]
Week of 1 Sep
Money Talks (Allen Funt)The Salzburg Connection (Lee Katzin)
Week of 25 Aug
And Now for Something Completely Different (Ian MacNaughton)Arruza (Budd Boetticher)
Blacula (William Crain)
Now You See Him, Now You Don't (Robert Butler)
Rivals (Krishna Shah)
What's Good for the Goose (Manahem Golan) [1969]
Week of 18 Aug
Bluebeard (Edward Dmytryk)Boxcar Bertha (Martin Scorsese)
Charles—Dead or Alive (Alain Tanner) [1969]
Last of the Red Hot Lovers (Gene Saks)
Making the Blue Film (J. Nehemiah)
Melinda (Hugh A. Robertson)
1,000 Convicts and a Woman (Ray Austin)
Phantom India Part Seven: Bombay (Louis Malle)
Pope Joan (Michael Anderson)
Slaughter (Jack Starrett)
Snoopy, Come Home (Bill Melendez)
Stigma (David E. Durston)
Week of 11 Aug
Alf 'n Family (Norman Cohen) [1968]Brother Carl (Susan Sontag)
Phantom India Part Six: On the Fringes of Indian Society (Louis Malle)
Return of Sabata (Frank Kramer)
Week of 4 Aug
"Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex"* *But Were Afraid to Ask (Woody Allen)Four Flies on Grey Velvet (Dario Argento)
Greaser's Palace (Robert Downey)
Junior Bonner (Sam Peckinpah)
Kansas City Bomber (Jerrold Freedman)
La Salamandre (Alain Tanner)
The Magnificent Seven Ride! (George McCowan)
The New Centurions (Richard Fleischer)
Richard (Lorees Yerby)
Super Fly (Gordon Parks, Jr.)
Until Monday (S. Rostotskiy) [1968]
Week of 28 Jul
Deliverance (John Boorman)Fat City (John Huston)
Marjoe (Howard Smith & Sarah Kernochan)
The Night Evelyn Came out of the Grave (Emilio P. Miraglia)
Parades (Robert J. Siegel)
Week of 21 Jul
F.T.A. (Francine Parker)Joe Kidd (John Sturges)
Late Spring (Yasujiro Ozu) [1949]
The Man (Joseph Sargent)
Our Latin Thing (Leon J. Gast)
Phantom India Part Five: A Look at Castes (Louis Malle) [1969]
The Public Eye (Carol Reed)
Stand Up and Be Counted (Jackie Cooper)
Week of 14 Jul
Fuzz (Richard A. Colla)The Godson* (Jean-Pierre Melville) [1967]
Hands of the Ripper (Peter Sasdy)
Living Free (Jack Couffer)
Twins of Evil (John Hough)
The Wrath of God (Ralph Nelson)
* Considerably better known today as Le Samouraï.
Week of 7 Jul
Butterflies Are Free (Milton Katselas)Frogs (George McCowan)
Jamilya (Irina Poplavskaya & Sergei Yutkevich) [1969]
Phantom India Part Four: Dream and Reality (Louis Malle) [1969]
Week of 30 Jun
The Candidate (Michael Ritchie)Come Back Charleston Blue (Mark Warren)
Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (J. Lee Thompson)
Duck You Sucker (Sergio Leone)
The Happiness Cage (Bernard Girard)
Prime Cut (Michael Ritchie)
Savages (James Ivory)
Week of 23 Jun
Ben (Phil Karlson)The Dead Are Alive (Armando Crispino)
Frenzy (Alfred Hitchcock)
The Gods and the Dead (Ruy Guerra)
The Groundstar Conspiracy (Lamont Johnson)
Phantom India Part Three: The Indians and the Sacred (Louis Malle) [1969]
Portnoy's Complaint (Ernest Lehman)
The Revengers (Daniel Mann)
Shaft's Big Score! (Gordon Parks)
Week of 16 Jun
Black Rodeo (Jeff Kanew)The Burglars (Henri Verneuil)
Every Little Crook & Nanny (Cy Howard)
Fillmore (Richard Heffron)
The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid (Philip Kaufman)
One Is a Lonely Number (Mel Stuart)
A Place Called Today (Don Schain)
Sitting Target (Douglas Hickox)
The Strange Vengeance of Rosalie (Jack Starrett)
What Became of Jack & Jill? (Bill Bain)
Week of 9 Jun
The Black Belly of the Tarantula (Paolo Cavara)Bronco Bullfrog (Barney Platts-Mills)
The Cross and the Switchblade (Don Murray)
Eroticon (Richard Lacey)
The Green Wall (Armando Robles Godoy) [1969]
Intimacies of a Prostitute (Armando Bo)
Phantom India Part Two: Things Seen in Madras (Louis Malle) [1969]
Red Sun (Terence Young)
Sex Freedom in Germany (Dieter Geissler)
The Weekend Murders (Michele Lupo)
Week of 2 Jun
Caged Men (Edward J. Forsythe)A Day in the Death of Joe Egg (Peter Medak)
The Final Comedown (Oscar Williams)
Fright (Peter Collinson)
Hammersmith Is Out (Peter Ustinov)
One Brief Summer (John Mackenzie)
Top of the Heap (Christopher St. John)
The War Between Men and Women (Melville Shavelson)
Week of 26 May
Dreamwood (James Broughton)Hannie Caulder (Burt Kennedy)
Libido: The Urge to Love (Max P´cas)
Malcolm X (Arnold Perl)
The Other (Robert Mulligan)
The Pied Piper (Jacques Demy)
The Possession of Joel Delaney (Waris Hussein)
Skyjacked (John Guillermin)
Z.P.G. (Michael Campus)
Week of 19 May
Blood From the Mummy's Tomb (Seth Holt)Cindy & Donna (Robert Anderson)
Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde (Roy Ward Baker)
The Honkers (Steve Ihnat)
Horror on Snape Island (Jim O'Connolly)
I Love You, I Kill You (Uwe Brandner)
The Legend of Nigger Charley (Martin Goldman)
Phantom India Part One: The Impossible Camera (Louis Malle) [1969]
Red Detachment of Women (Pan Wenzhan & Fu Jie)
The Stepmother (Hikmet Avedis)
The Trial of the Catonsville Nine (Gordon Davidson)
Uncle Vanya (Andrey Mikhalov-Konchalovskiy)
Week of 12 May
Bedroom Mazurka (John Hilbard)J W Coop (Cliff Robertson)
Week of 5 May
I Want What I Want (John Dexter)Je t'aime, je t'aime (Alain Resnais) [1968]
Macunaíma (Joachim Pedro de Andrade) [1969]
Play It Again, Sam (Herbert Ross)
Week of 28 Apr
Buck and the Preacher (Sidney Poitier)Fritz the Cat (Ralph Bakshi)
A Full Life (Susumu Hani) [1962]
Journey Through Rosebud (Tom Gries)
Soul Soldier (John Cardos)
Ten Days' Wonder (Claude Chabrol)
Week of 21 Apr
My Uncle Antoine (Claude Jutra)Pocket Money (Stuart Rosenberg)
Puppet on a Chain (Geoffrey Reeve)
Tom, Tom, the Piper's Son (Ken Jacobs) [1969]
Week of 14 Apr
The Culpepper Cattle Co. (Dick Richards)Loot (Silvio Narizzano)
Week of 7 Apr
The Arch (Shu-hsuan T'ang) [1968]Mark of the Devil (Michael Armstrong)
The Policeman (Ephraim Kishon)
The Saragossa Manuscript (Wojciech J. Has) [1965]
Tomorrow (Joseph Anthony)
Week of 31 Mar
Blindman (Ferdinando Baldi)The Carey Treatment (Blake Edwards)
Cool Breeze (Barry Pollack)
No-More (Robert Nelson)
Silent Running (Douglas Trumbull)
Week of 24 Mar
The Concert for Bangladesh (Saul Swimmer)Gumshoe (Stephen Frears)
Russia (Theodore Holcomb)
Slaughterhouse-Five (George Roy Hill)
Week of 17 Mar
Chrome and Hot Leather (Lee Frost)The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola)
The Moon and the Sledgehammer (Philip Trevelyan)
Scarecrow in a Garden of Cucumbers (Robert J. Kaplan)
The Sorrow and the Pity (Marcel Ophuls) [1969]
Toyko Story (Yasujiro Ozu) [1953]
Who Slew Auntie Roo? (Curtis Harrington)
Week of 10 Mar
Georgia, Georgia (Stig Björkman)Luminous Procuress (Steven Arnold)
Tales From the Crypt (Freddie Francis)
What's Up, Doc? (Peter Bogdanovich)
Zatoichi's Revenge (Akira Inoue) [1965]
Week of 3 Mar
The Bang Bang Gang (Van Guylder)Chandler (Paul Magwood)
Clay Pigeon (Tom Stern & Lane Slate)
The Dean's Wife (Benjamin Onivas)
Out There, a Lone Island (Humphrey Leynse) [1969]
Sometimes a Great Notion (Paul Newman)
Zatoichi's Critical Moment (director unknown)*
* I don't currently know which film in the Zatoichi series this is, as the
title Zatoichi's Critical Moment appears nowhere else on the
Internet and there's literally no other information in the New York
Times ad (and no review).
Week of 25 Feb
Dealing: Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues (Paul Williams)I Want What I Want (John Dexter)
Image, Flesh and Voice (Ed Emshwiller) [1969]
No Drums, No Bugles (Clyde Ware)
Outback (Ted Kotcheff)*
* Better known today as Wake in Fright.
Week of 18 Feb
The Nightcomers (Michael Winner)Permissive (Lindsay Shonteff)
Pete Seeger: A Song and a Stone (Robert Elfstrom)
The Seduction of Inga (Joseph W. Sarno)
To Die of Love (André Cayatte)
Without Apparent Motive (Philippe Labro)
Women in Revolt (Paul Morrissey)
Week of 11 Feb
Cabaret (Bob Fosse)Hollywood Babylon (Van Guylder)
One P.M. (D.A. Pennebaker & Jean-Luc Godard)
Week of 4 Feb
Bartleby (Anthony Friedmann)The Jerusalem File (John Flynn)
Mary, Queen of Scots (Charles Jarrott)
Murders in the Rue Morgue (Gordon Hessler)
The Return of Count Yorga (Bob Kelljan)
Snow Job (George Englund)
The Visitors (Elia Kazan)
Week of 28 Jan
The Abductors (Don Schain)The Hot Rock (Peter Yates)
Tenchu (Hideo Gosha) [1969]
Winter Soldier (no director credited)
X Y & Zee (Brian G. Hutton)
Week of 21 Jan
For Example (Arakawa)Ganga Zumba (Carlos Diegues) [1963]
Smic, Smac, Smoc (Claude Lelouch)
To Find a Man (Buzz Kulik)
Together (Sean S. Cunningham)
Week of 14 Jan
Angela Davis: Portrait of a Revolutionary (Yolande DuLuart)Cisco Pike (Bill L. Norton)
The Cowboys (Mark Rydell)
Week of 7 Jan
The Butterfly (Alexis Neve)Eagle in a Cage (Fielder Cook)
Glass Houses (Alexander Singer)
The Tattooed Swordswoman (Hideo Sekigawa) [1968]
Tower of Screaming Women (Francois Legrand) [1968]
The Vampire Doll (Michio Yamamoto)