New York City 1988 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 30 Dec
A Hungarian Fairy Tale (Gyula Gazdag)Life Is a Dream (Raúl Ruiz)
Week of 23 Dec
The Accidental Tourist (Lawrence Kasdan)Beaches (Garry Marshall)
The Boost (Harold Becker)
Burning Secret (Andrew Birkin)
Dangerous Liaisons (Stephen Frears)
A Forgotten Tune for the Flute (Eldar Ryazanov)
Genesis (Mrinal Sen)
Hellbound: Hellraiser II (Tony Randel)
Pelle the Conqueror (Bille August)
Talk Radio (Oliver Stone)
Vicious (Karl Zwicky)
We Think the World of You (Colin Gregg)
Working Girl (Mike Nichols)
Week of 16 Dec
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (Frank Oz)The House of Bernarda Alba (Mario Camus)
My Friend Ivan Lapshin (Aleksei Gherman)
Rain Man (Barry Levinson)
Sierra Leone (Uwe Schrader)
Torch Song Trilogy (Paul Bogart)
Week of 9 Dec
Amerika, Terra Incognita (Diego Rísquez)Mississippi Burning (Alan Parker)
My Stepmother Is an Alien (Richard Benjamin)
Retracing Steps: American Dance Since Postmodernism (Michael Blackwood)
Troma's War (Michael Herz & Samuel Weil)
Twins (Ivan Reitman)
Week of 2 Dec
Dakota (Fred Holmes)The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (David Zucker)
Nobody Listened (Néstor Almendros & Jorge Ulla)
Tequila Sunrise (Robert Towne)
Week of 25 Nov
Big Girl (Nirit Yaron-Gronich)Buster (David Green)
Cocoon: The Return (Daniel Petrie)
Crows (Ayelet Menahemi)
Full Moon in Blue Water (Peter Masterson)
Hanna's War (Menahem Golan)
Night of the Demons (Kevin S. Tenney)
Scrooged (Richard Donner)
We the Living (Goffredo Alessandrini) [1942]
Week of 18 Nov
Fresh Horses (David Anspaugh)High Spirits (Neil Jordan)
The Land Before Time (Don Bluth)
1969 (Ernest Thompson)
Oliver & Company (George Scribner)
Twice Dead (Bert Dragin)
Where Spring Comes Late (Yôji Yamada) [1970]
Week of 11 Nov
Child's Play (Tom Holland)A Cry in the Dark (Fred Schepisi)
Distant Thunder (Rick Rosenthal)
Ernest Saves Christmas (John Cherry)
Far North (Sam Shepard)
Hello Actors Studio (Annie Tresgot)
Iron Eagle II (Sidney J. Furie)
Spike of Bensonhurst (Paul Morrissey)
Violence at Noon (Nagisa Oshima) [1966]
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Pedro Almodóvar)
Week of 4 Nov
Everybody's All-American (Taylor Hackford)The Good Mother (Leonard Nimoy)
River of Fireflies (Eizo Sugawa)
They Live (John Carpenter)
U2 Rattle and Hum (Phil Joanou)
Week of 28 Oct
Feds (Dan Goldberg)Film Actress (Kon Ichikawa)
Gonza the Spearman (Masahiro Shinoda)
Into the Fire (Graeme Campbell)
Streams of Consciousness: 13 New American Animations (various)
Week of 21 Oct
Bat*21 (Peter Markle)Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (Dwight H. Little)
Homecoming (Yim Ho) [1984]
The Lair of the White Worm (Ken Russell)
Little Dorrit (Christine Edzard)
Mystic Pizza (Donald Petrie)
Things Change (David Mamet)
Without a Clue (Thom Eberhardt)
Week of 14 Oct
The Accused (Jonathan Kaplan)Another Woman (Woody Allen)
The Boxer and Death (Peter Solan) [1963]
The Kiss (Pen Densham)
The Last Emperor (Li Han Hsiang)
Madame Sousatzka (John Schlesinger)
Red Sorghum (Zhang Yimou)
A Winter Tan (Jackie Burroughs & Louise Clark & John Frizzell & John Walker & Aerlyn Weissman)
The 21st International Tournee of Animation (various)
Week of 7 Oct
Alien Nation (Graham Baker)Clara's Heart (Robert Mulligan)
Debajo del mundo (Beda Docampo Feijóo & Juan Bautista Stagnaro)
Hôtel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie (Marcel Ophüls)
Imagine: John Lennon (Andrew Solt)
The Man With Three Coffins (Lee Chang-Ho)
A Promise (Yoshishige Yoshida)
Salaam Bombay! (Mira Nair)
Week of 30 Sep
Big Time (Chris Blum)Bird (Clint Eastwood)
Cane Toads: An Unnatural History (Mark Lewis)
Elvira, Mistress of the Dark (James Signorelli)
Heartbreak Hotel (Chris Columbus)
Memories of Me (Henry Winkler)
Nanou (Conny Templeman)
Nightfall (Paul Mayersberg)
Punchline (David Seltzer)
Week of 23 Sep
Dead Ringers (David Cronenberg)Gorillas in the Mist (Michael Apted)
Ground Zero (Michael Pattinson & Bruce Myles)
Kansas (David Stevens)
Murder One (Graeme Campbell)
Patty Hearst (Paul Schrader)
Sweet Hearts Dance (Robert Greenwald)
Tiger Warsaw (Amin Q. Chaudhri)
Week of 16 Sep
The Beast (Kevin Reynolds)Dear America: Letters Home From Vietnam (Bill Couturié)
The Love Child (Robert Smith)
Mama Turns 100 (Carlos Saura) [1979]
Matador (Pedro Almodóvar)
Messenger of Death (J. Lee Thompson)
Miles From Home (Gary Sinise)
The Prince of Pennsylvania (Ron Nyswaner)
Seven Hours to Judgment (Beau Bridges)
Tougher Than Leather (Rick Rubin)
Week of 9 Sep
Defense Play (Monte Markham)Doc's Kingdom (Robert Kramer)
Killer Klowns From Outer Space (Stephen Chiodo)
Moon Over Parador (Paul Mazursky)
Running on Empty (Sidney Lumet)
Track 29 (Nicolas Roeg)
Week of 2 Sep
BraveStarr, the Movie (Tom Tataranowicz)The Deceivers (Nicholas Meyer)
Eight Men Out (John Sayles)
Freeway (Francis Delia)
The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (Christopher Rawlence)
Rocket Gibraltar (Daniel Petrie)
The Wizard of Loneliness (Jenny Bowen)
Week of 26 Aug
Bandits (Claude Lelouch)Betrayed (Costa-Gavras)
Coverup: Behind the Iran Contra Affair (Barbara Trent)
Crossing Delancey (Joan Micklin Silver)
Hero and the Terror (William Tannen)
Hot to Trot (Michael Dinner)
Stealing Home (Steven Kampman & Will Aldis)
The Thin Blue Line (Errol Morris)
A Time to Remember (Thomas Travers)
The Year My Voice Broke (John Duigan)
Week of 19 Aug
The Beer Drinker's Guide to Fitness and Filmmaking (Fred G. Sullivan)The Big Blue (Luc Besson)
The Burglar (Valery Ogorodnikov)
Married to the Mob (Jonathan Demme)
A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (Renny Harlin)
The Wash (Michael Toshiyuki Uno)
Week of 12 Aug
Clean and Sober (Glenn Gordon Caron)The Last Temptation of Christ (Martin Scorsese)
Late Summer Blues (Renen Schorr)
Mac and Me (Stewart Raffill)
A Summer Story (Piers Haggard)
Tucker: The Man and His Dream (Francis Ford Coppola)
Young Guns (Christopher Cain)
Week of 5 Aug
Alice (Jan Svankmajer)The Blob (Chuck Russell)
The Rescue (Ferdinand Fairfax)
Vibes (Ken Kwapis)
Week of 29 Jul
Cocktail (Roger Donaldson)Family Viewing (Atom Egoyan)
Monkey Shines: An Experiment in Fear (George A. Romero)
The New Adventures of Pippi Longstocking (Ken Annakin)
Week of 22 Jul
Big Top Pee-Wee (Randal Kleiser)Caddyshack II (Alan Arkush)
The Color of Destiny (Jorge Durán)
God Doesn't Believe in Us Anymore (Axel Corti) [1982]
Home Remedy (Maggie Greenwald)
Midnight Run (Martin Brest)
Mr. North (Danny Huston)
Pascali's Island (James Dearden)
Santa Fe (Alex Corti)
Week of 15 Jul
The Berlin Affair (Liliana Cavani) [1985]Boyfriends and Girlfriends (Eric Rohmer)
The Dead Pool (Buddy Van Horn)
Die Hard (John McTiernan)
A Fish Called Wanda (Charles Crichton)
Love Suicides at Sonezaki (Midori Kurisaki) [1980]
Week of 8 Jul
Arthur 2 on the Rocks (Bud Yorkin)The Kitchen Toto (Harry Hook)
License to Drive (Greg Beeman)
Loose Connections (Richard Eyre) [1985]
Phantasm II (Don Coscarelli)
Shame (Steve Jodrell)
Short Circuit 2 (Kenneth Johnson)
Week of 1 Jul
Absolution (Anthony Page) [1978]Beirut: The Last Home Movie (Jennifer Fox)
Coming to America (John Landis)
Shy People (Andrei Konchalovsky)
Week of 24 Jun
Dudes (Penelope Spheeris)A Handful of Dust (Charles Sturridge)
Wedding in Galilee (Michel Khleifi)
Who Framed Roger Rabbit (Robert Zemeckis)
Week of 17 Jun
Bull Durham (Ron Shelton)Commissar (Alexander Askoldov) [1967]
The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years (Penelope Spheeris)
The Great Outdoors (Howard Deutch)
Oscar Wilde: Spendthrift of Genius (Seán O'Mórdha)
Red Heat (Walter Hill)
Rights and Reactions: Lesbian and Gay Rights on Trial (Phil Zwickler & Jane Lippman)
A World Apart (Chris Menges)
Week of 10 Jun
Beethoven's Nephew (Paul Morrissey) [1985]Big Business (Jim Abrahams)
Candy Mountain (Robert Frank & Rudy Wurlitzer)
Call Me Madame (Françoise Romand)
Hail Hazana (José María Gutiérrez Santos) [1978]
Les Rendez-vous d'Anna (Chantal Akerman) [1978]
Mix-Up (Françoise Romand)
Poltergeist III (Gary Sherman)
The Presidio (Peter Hyams)
Week of 3 Jun
American Gothic (John Hough)The Beat (Paul Mones)
Big (Penny Marshall)
The Drifter (Larry Brand)
Funny Farm (George Roy Hill)
History (Luigi Comenicini)
The Perfect Match (Mark Deimel)
South of Reno (Mark Rezyka)
Welcome in Vienna (Axel Corti)
The Wrong Guys (Danny Bilson)
Week of 27 May
Crocodile Dundee II (John Cornell)Dragon Chow (Jan Schütte)
My Best Friend Is a Vampire (Jimmy Huston)
The Penitent (Cliff Osmond)
Rambo III (Peter MacDonald)
The Tale of Ruby Rose (Roger Scholes)
Week of 20 May
Aria (various)Call Me (Sollace Mitchell)
I Don't Give a Damn (Shmuel Imberman)
Rikky and Pete (Nadia Tass)
Saturday Night at the Palace (Robert Davies)
Shattered Dreams: Picking Up the Pieces (Victor Schonfeld)
Slaughterhouse Rock (Dimitri Logothetis)
The Suicide Club (James Bruce) Tent of Miracles (Nelson Pereira dos Santos) [1977]
White of the Eye (Donald Cammell)
Willow (Ron Howard)
World Gone Wild (Lee H. Katzin)
Week of 13 May
Bulletproof (Steve Carver)Friday the 13th Part VII—The New Blood (John Carl Buechler)
Lady in White (Frank LaLoggia)
Light Years (René Laloux)
The Lighthorsemen (Simon Wincer)
Maniac Cop (William Lustig)
Midnight Crossing (Roger Holzberg)
The Record (Daniel Helfer) [1984]
A Taxing Woman (Juzo Itami)
Week of 6 May
Dark Habits (Pedro Almodóvar) [1983]Dead Heat (Mark Goldblatt)
In a Shallow Grave (Kenneth Bowser)
Jack's Back (Rowdy Herrington)
Judgment in Berlin (Leo Penn)
Mala noche (Gus Van Sant)
The Mass Is Ended (Nanni Moretti) [1985]
Riders of the Storm (Maurice Phillips)
Salome's Last Dance (Ken Russell)
Salsa (Boaz Davidson)
Shakedown (James Glickenhaus)
Sticky Fingers (Catlin Adams)
38: Vienna Before the Fall (Wolfgang Glück)
Week of 29 Apr
Critters 2 (Mick Garris)Da (Matt Clark)
A Hungry Feeling: The Life and Death of Brendan Behan (Allan Miller)
I Hate Actors! (Gérard Krawczyk)
Powaqqatsi (Godfrey Reggio)
Sunset (Blake Edwards)
Two Moon Junction (Zalman King)
Wings of Desire (Wim Wenders)
Week of 22 Apr
Bagdad Cafe (Percy Adlon)Bloodsport (Newt Arnold)
The Blue Iguana (John Lafia)
Casual Sex? (Genevieve Robert)
Eat the Rich (Peter Richardson)
Love Is a Dog From Hell (Dominique Deruddere)
Mondo New York (Harvey Keith)
Permanent Record (Marisa Silver)
Someone to Love (Henry Jaglom)
Stormy Monday (Mike Figgis)
A Time of Destiny (Gregory Nava)
The Unholy (Camilo Vila)
White Mischief (Michael Radford)
Week of 15 Apr
Appointment With Death (Michael Winner)Brain Damage (Frank Henenlotter)
Colors (Dennis Hopper)
The Moderns (Alan Rudolph)
Plain Clothes (Martha Coolidge)
Retribution (Guy Magar)
Return to Snowy River (Geoff Burrowes)
She Must Be Seeing Things (Sheila McLaughlin)
Tokyo Pop (Fran Rubel Kuzui)
Zelly & Me (Tina Rathborne)
Week of 8 Apr
Above the Law (Andrew Davis)Bad Dreams (Andrew Fleming)
Consuming Passions (Giles Foster)
18 Again! (Paul Flaherty)
From the Pole to the Equator (Yervant Gianikian & Angela Ricci Lucchi)
The Pointsman (Jos Stelling)
Week of 1 Apr
Beetlejuice (Tim Burton)Bellman and True (Richard Loncraine)
Bright Lights, Big City (James Bridges)
The Invisible Kid (Avery Crounse)
The Man in the Silk Hat (Maud Linder) [1983]
Night Zoo (Jean-Claude Lauzon)
Playing Away (Horace Ové)
The Seventh Sign (Carl Schultz)
Sorceress (Suzanne Schiffman)
Week of 25 Mar
Biloxi Blues (Mike Nichols)High Season (Clare Peploe)
Johnny Be Good (Bud Smith)
Le Caviar rouge (Robert Hossein)
A New Life (Alan Alda)
Subway to the Stars (Carlos Diegues)
Week of 18 Mar
Beatrice (Bertrand Tavernier)D.O.A. (Rocky Morton & Annabel Jankel)
Dominick and Eugene (Robert M. Young)
Levy and Goliath (Gérard Oury)
Little Nikita (Richard Benjamin)
The Milagro Beanfield War (Robert Redford)
O.C. and Stiggs (Robert Altman)
Police Academy 5: Assignment Miami Beach (Alan Myerson)
Stand and Deliver (Ramon Menendez)
Stars & Bars (Pat O'Connor)
The Two Lives of Mattia Pascal (Mario Monicelli) [1985]
Vincent: The Life and Death of Vincent Van Gogh (Paul Cox)
Week of 11 Mar
Masquerade (Bob Swaim)Off Limits (Christopher Crowe)
Vice Versa (Brian Gilbert)
When the Wind Blows (Jimmy T. Murakami)
Week of 4 Mar
And God Created Woman (Roger Vadim)Babette's Feast (Gabriel Axel)
Girl From Hunan (Xie Fei & U Lan)
The House on Carroll Street (Peter Yates)
A Jumpin' Night in the Garden of Eden (Michal Goldman)
Moving (Alan Metter)
Prison (Renny Harlin)
Switching Channels (Ted Kotcheff)
Traffic Jam (Luigi Comencini) [1979]
Week of 26 Feb
Aloha Summer (Tommy Lee Wallace)Apprentice to Murder (R.L. Thomas)
End of the Line (Jay Russell)
Frantic (Roman Polanski)
Hairspray (John Waters)
The Last Minute (Pupi Avati)
A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon (William Richert)
Scavengers (Duncan McLachlan)
Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will Be Done (Antony Thomas)
Week of 19 Feb
Frida (Paul Leduc Rosenzweig) [1983]High Tide (Gillian Armstrong)
Lust for Freedom (Eric Louzil)
A Month in the Country (Pat O'Connor)
The Nest (Terence H. Winkless)
Stranded (Tex Fuller)
Week of 12 Feb
Action Jackson (Craig R. Baxley)Au revoir les enfants (Louis Malle)
The Gold Diggers (Sally Potter) [1983]
Los Ambiciosos (Luis Buñuel) [1959]
Satisfaction (Joan Freeman)
School Daze (Spike Lee)
Shoot to Kill (Roger Spottiswoode)
The Telephone (Rip Torn)
A Tiger's Tale (Peter Douglas)
Traveling North (Carl Schultz)
Week of 5 Feb
The Computer Animation Show (various)Cop (James B. Harris)
Crazy Moon (Allan Eastman)
Distant Harmony (DeWitt Sage)
Hoxsey: Quacks Who Cure Cancer? (Ken Ausubel)
Julia and Julia (Peter Del Monte)
The Serpent and the Rainbow (Wes Craven)
She's Having a Baby (John Hughes)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Philip Kaufman)
Week of 29 Jan
Anguish (Bigas Luna)Mélo (Alain Resnais)
Singing the Blues in Red (Kenneth Loach)
The Tree We Hurt (Dimos Avdeliodis)
You Can't Hurry Love (Richard Martini)
Week of 22 Jan
Braddock: Missing in Action III (Aaron Norris)The Family (Ettore Scola)
Five Corners (Tony Bill)
The Grand Highway (Jean-Loup Hubert)
Half of Heaven (Manuel Gutiérrez Aragón)
King Lear (Jean-Luc Godard)
The Misfit Brigade (Gordon Hessler)
Promised Land (Michael Hoffman)
Three Strange Loves (Ingmar Bergman) [1949]
Week of 15 Jan
The Couch Trip (Michael Ritchie)El Sur (Victor Erice) [1983]
For Keeps (John G. Avildsen)
Patti Rocks (David Burton Morris)
Rent-A-Cop (Jerry London)
Return of the Living Dead Part II (Ken Wiederhorn)
Stacking (Martin Rosen)
Week of 8 Jan
The Horse Thief (Tian Zhuangzhuang)