New York City 1980 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 26 Dec
Altered States (Ken Russell)'Breaker' Morant (Bruce Beresford)
First Family (Buck Henry)
Magicians of the Silver Screen (Jirí Menzel)
The Picture Show Man (John Power) [1977]
Week of 19 Dec
Any Which Way You Can (Buddy Van Horn)Black & Blue (Jay Dubin)
A Change of Seasons (Richard Lang)
Empire of Passion (Nagisa Oshima)
The Formula (John G. Avildsen)
Inside Moves (Richard Donner)
The Jazz Singer (Richard Fleischer)
The Mirror Crack'd... (Guy Hamilton)
Mon oncle d'Amérique (Alain Resnais)
Nine to Five (Colin Higgins)
Seems Like Old Times (Jay Sandrich)
Tell Me a Riddle (Lee Grant)
Week of 12 Dec
Hungry Wives (George A. Romero) [1972]Popeye (Robert Altman)
Sam's Song (Jordan Leondopoulos) [1969]
Steel (Steve Carver)
Stir Crazy (Sidney Poitier)
Tess (Roman Polanski)
Tribute (Bob Clark)
Week of 5 Dec
The Competition (Joel Oliansky)Dragon vs. Needles of Death (Kou Hung Chong) [1975]
Flash Gordon (Mike Hodges)
The Happy Hooker Goes Hollywood (Alan Roberts)
Reggae Sunsplash (Stefan Paul)
Return of the Tiger (Jimmy Shaw) [1977]
There Goes the Bride (Terry Marcel)
Week of 28 Nov
The Perfumed Nightmare (Kidlat Tahimik) [1977]Rockshow (Jack Priestley)
Week of 21 Nov
The Boogey Man (Ulli Lommel)Falling in Love Again (Steven Paul)
Heaven's Gate (Michael Cimino)
Shogun Assassin (Robert Houston)*
Space Movie (Tony Palmer)
* Houston is the only director credited on the ad (albeit for the
"American version"), even though Kenji Misumi obviously shot all the
footage. For the record, I haven't actually seen Shogun Assassin,
but it's blue anyway because I consider it merely a variant of Lone
Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx, which I have
seen.
Week of 14 Nov
Agee (Ross Spears)The Day Time Ended (John 'Bud' Cardos)
The Idolmaker (Taylor Hackford)
It's Not the Size That Counts (Ralph Thomas) [1974]
Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese)
Week of 7 Nov
Children of Babylon (Lennie Little-White)From the Life of the Marionettes (Ingmar Bergman)
Oh Heavenly Dog (Joe Camp)
Resurrection (Daniel Petrie)
Sir Henry at Rawlinson End (Steve Roberts)
Week of 31 Oct
The Awakening (Mike Newell)Borderline (Jerrold Freedman)
Touched by Love (Gus Trikonis)
Week of 24 Oct
The First Deadly Sin (Brian Hutton)It's My Turn (Claudia Weill)
Loving Couples (Jack Smight)
Motel Hell (Kevin Connor)
Week of 17 Oct
The Baltimore Bullet (Robert Ellis Miller)Eraserhead (David Lynch) [1977]
Fade to Black (Vernon Zimmerman)
Foolin' Around (Richard T. Heffron)
Loulou (Maurice Pialat)
Melvin and Howard (Jonathan Demme)
Middle Age Crazy (John Trent)
The Stunt Man (Richard Rush)
Themroc (Claude Faraldo) [1973]
Times Square (Alan Moyle)
Worlds Apart (Barbara Noble)
Week of 10 Oct
Bye Bye Brazil (Carlos Diegues)Every Man for Himself (Jean-Luc Godard)
Kagemusha (Akira Kurosawa)
Private Benjamin (Howard Zieff)
Why Would I Lie? (Larry Peerce)
Week of 3 Oct
Coast to Coast (Joseph Sargent)The Elephant Man (David Lynch)
Gloria (John Cassavetes)
Oh, God! Book II (Gilbert Cates)
One-Trick Pony (Robert M. Young)
Sam Marlow, Private Eye (Robert Day)
Somewhere in Time (Jeannot Szwarc)
Terror Train (Roger Spottiswoode)
Week of 26 Sep
Bad Timing (Nicolas Roeg)Divine Madness (Michael Ritchie)
He Knows You're Alone (Armand Mastroianni)
Hopscotch (Ronald Neame)
Hullabaloo Over Georgie & Bonnie's Pictures (James Ivory)
In God We Trust (Marty Feldman)
Stardust Memories (Woody Allen)
The Tempest (Derek Jarman)
Union City (Mark Reichert)
When a Stranger Calls (Fred Walton)
Without Warning (Greydon Clark)
Week of 19 Sep
Mother's Day (Charles Kaufman)Ordinary People (Robert Redford)
Summer Camp (Chuck Vincent)
Week of 12 Sep
Anti-Clock (Jane Arden & Jack Bond)The Big Brawl (Robert Clouse)
The Exterminator (James Glickenhaus)
Herbie Goes Bananas (Vincent McEveety)
Honeysuckle Rose (Jerry Schatzberg)
The Mountain Men (Richard Lang)
Return of the Secaucus 7 (John Sayles)
Week of 5 Sep
The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (Fred Schepisi)
Week of 29 Aug
Those Lips, Those Eyes (Michael Pressman)
Week of 22 Aug
The Adventures of Picasso (Tage Danielsson)Jun (Hiroto Yokoyama)
Make Room for Tomorrow (Peter Kassovitz)
The Octagon (Eric Karson)
Scum (Alan Clarke)
Used Cars (Robert Zemeckis)
Week of 15 Aug
Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (And Don't Come Back!) (Bill Melendez)The Kidnapping of the President (George Mendeluk)
Prom Night (Paul Lynch)
Smokey and the Bandit II (Hal Needham)
Willie & Phil (Paul Mazursky)
Week of 8 Aug
Battle Beyond the Stars (Jimmy T. Murakami)Don't Answer the Phone! (Robert Hammer)
The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu (Piers Haggard)
Twinkle, Twinkle, 'Killer' Kane (William Peter Blatty)
Xanadu (Robert Greenwald)
Week of 1 Aug
The Final Countdown (Don Taylor)The Getting of Wisdom (Bruce Beresford) [1977]
The Hunter (Buzz Kulik)
The Last Flight of Noah's Ark (Charles Jarrott)
My Bodyguard (Tony Bill)
Raise the Titanic (Jerry Jameson)
Strange Masquerade (Pál Sándor) [1976]
Week of 25 Jul
Arabian Nights (Pier Paolo Pasolini) [1974]Caddyshack (Harold Ramis)
Dressed to Kill (Brian De Palma)
Rude Boy (Jack Hazan & David Mingay)
Zombie (Lucio Fulci)
Week of 18 Jul
Almost Human (Umberto Lenzi) [1974]The Big Red One (Samuel Fuller)
Cheech and Chong's Next Movie (Thomas Chong)
The Great Santini (Lewis John Carlino)
Honeysuckle Rose (Jerry Schatzberg)
Les Petites Fugues (Yves Yersin)
No Nukes (Julian Schlossberg & Danny Goldberg & Anthony Potenza)
Week of 11 Jul
How to Beat the High Cost of Living (Robert Scheerer)Kill or Be Killed (Ivan Hall) [1976]
Practice Makes Perfect (Philippe de Broca)
Week of 4 Jul
Airplane! (Jim Abrahams & David Zucker & Jerry Zucker)Barocco (André Téchiné) [1976]
The Children (Max Kalmanowicz)
Summer Showers (Carlos Diegues)
Week of 27 Jun
Rockers (Theodoros Bafaloukos)
Week of 20 Jun
The Baby (Ted Post) [1973]The Blue Lagoon (Randal Kleiser)
The Blues Brothers (John Landis)
Brubaker (Stuart Rosenberg)
Can't Stop the Music (Nancy Walker)
The Last of the Blue Devils (Bruce Ricker)
Michael Kohlhaas (Volker Schlöndorff) [1969]
Rough Cut (Don Siegel)
Week of 13 Jun
Bronco Billy (Clint Eastwood)The Brothers Karamazov (Ivan Pyryev) [1969]
Carny (Robert Kaylor)
In a Year of 13 Moons (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
The Island (Michael Ritchie)
Mad Max (George Miller)
Roadie (Alan Rudolph)
Urban Cowboy (James Bridges)
Wholly Moses! (Gary Weis)
Week of 6 Jun
Dinner for Adele (Oldrich Lipsky)Floating Clouds (Mikio Naruse) [1955]
The Hearse (George Bowers)
Humanoids From the Deep (Barbara Peeters)
Night of the Juggler (Robert Butler)
No Regrets for Our Youth (Akira Kurosawa) [1946]
Up the Academy (Robert Downey)
Week of 30 May
The Canterbury Tales (Pier Paolo Pasolini) [1972]Don't Go in the House (Joseph Ellison)
Dracula and Son (Edward Molinaro) [1976]
Wifemistress (Marco Vicario) [1977]
Week of 23 May
Die Laughing (Jeff Werner)The Gong Show Movie (Chuck Barris)
The Shining (Stanley Kubrick)
Star Wars: Episode V—The Empire Strikes Back (Irvin Kershner)
Tom Horn (William Wiard)
Week of 16 May
Fame (Alan Parker)The Hollywood Knights (Floyd Mutrux)
Home Movies (Brian De Palma)
The Long Riders (Walter Hill)
Love at First Bite (Stan Dragoti)
Meetings With Remarkable Men (Peter Brook)
Week of 9 May
Charles et Lucie (Nelly Kaplan)Friday the 13th (Sean S. Cunningham)
The Nude Bomb (Clive Donner)
Runnin' After Love (Carlos Hugo Christensen)
Week of 2 May
Happy Birthday, Gemini (Richard Benner)L'Âge d'or (Luis Buñuel) [1930]
On the Nickel (Ralph Waite)
The Thirty Nine Steps (Don Sharp)
Week of 25 Apr
The Budding of Brie (Henri Pachard)Death Ship (Alvin Rakoff)
Get Rollin' (J. Terrance Mitchell)
Heart Beat (John Byrum)
Knife in the Head (Reinhard Hauff)
Where the Buffalo Roam (Art Linson)
Week of 18 Apr
The Battle of Chile (Part 3): Power of the People (Patricio Guzmán)ffolkes (Andrew V. McLaglen)
Mannequin (Claude Pessis) [1974]
Nothing Personal (George Bloomfield)
Soupçon (Jean-Charles Tacchella)
The Watcher in the Woods (John Hough)
Week of 11 Apr
Incorrigible (Philippe de Broca) [1975]Night Games (Roger Vadim)
The Tin Drum (Volker Schlöndorff)
Week of 4 Apr
The Left-Handed Woman (Peter Handke)Penitentiary (Jamaa Fanaka)
Sitting Ducks (Henry Jaglom)
Week of 28 Mar
The Changeling (Peter Medak)Gilda Live (Mike Nichols)
Jesus (Peter Sykes & John Kirsh)
Little Darlings (Ronald F. Maxwell)
Serial (Bill Persky)
When Time Ran Out... (James Goldstone)
The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy) [1973]
Week of 21 Mar
Clair de femme (Costa-Gavras)Eboli (Francesco Rosi)
Hide in Plain Sight (James Caan)
Little Miss Marker (Walter Bernstein)
Nijinsky (Herbert Ross)
The War at Home (Glenn Silber & Barry Alexander Brown)
Week of 14 Mar
Defiance (John Flynn)The Fifth Floor (Howard Avedis)
Joe and Maxi (Maxi Cohen & Joel Gold)
The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover (Larry Cohen) [1977]
A Small Circle of Friends (Rob Cohen)
Week of 7 Mar
The Black Marble (Harold Becker)Blaise Pascal (Roberto Rossellini) [1972]
Coal Miner's Daughter (Michael Apted)
The Trials of Alger Hiss (John Lowenthal)
Week of 29 Feb
Best Boy (Ira Wohl)The Fog (John Carpenter)
A Force of One (Paul Aaron)
Foxes (Adrian Lyne)
Simon (Marshall Brickman)
Week of 22 Feb
Blood Feud (Lina Wertmuller)The Godsend (Gabrielle Beaumont)
The Immortal Bachelor (Marcello Fondato) [1975]
Week of 15 Feb
Cruising (William Friedkin)One & One (Erland Josephson & Ingrid Thulin & Sven Nykvist)
The Prize Fighter (Michael Preece)
Saturn 3 (Stanley Donen)
Wise Blood (John Huston)
Week of 8 Feb
Hero at Large (Martin Davidson)The Human Factor (Otto Preminger)
Just Tell Me What You Want (Sidney Lumet)
The Last Married Couple in America (Gilbert Cates)
A Simple Story (Claude Sautet)
Week of 1 Feb
American Gigolo (Paul Schrader)Fatso (Anne Bancroft)
My Brilliant Career (Gillian Armstrong)
Silent Scream (Denny Harris)
To Forget Venice (Franco Brusati)
Week of 25 Jan
Coup de tête (Jean-Jacques Annaud)Guyana—Cult of the Damned (Rene Cardona, Jr.)
Mozart—A Childhood Chronicle (Klaus Kirschner) [1976]
The Wrong Move (Wim Wenders) [1975]
Week of 18 Jan
The Apple Game (Vera Chytilová) [1977]Gizmo! (Howard Smith) [1977]
In Search of Historic Jesus (Henning Schellerup)
Windows (Gordon Willis)
Week of 11 Jan
Angi Vera (Pál Gábor)Mama Turns 100 (Carlos Saura)