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1988

Australia

– The Federal government establishes the Film Finance Corporation with first year funding of $70 million, offering a loan of up to 70% of a film’s production costs if the producer contributes the other 30%.  10BA tax concessions are reduced to 100% with all investment returns being treated as taxable income. [MORE] [ADD]

Belgium

– The Kinepolis, the world’s largest multiplex, is opened in Brussels by the Bert and Claeys families. [MORE] [ADD]

Cape Verde

– Antonio Faria’s Os Flagelados do Vento Leste, the first – and to date only – film made in the Cape Verde Islands is released.  [MORE] [ADD]

Cuba

– The ICAIC establishes ‘los Grupos de Creación’ headed by Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, Humberto Solás and Manuel Pérez. [MORE] [ADD]

Denmark

11/4 -

Gabriel Axel’s Babettes gæstebud (Babette’s Feast) becomes the first Danish film to win the Best Foreign Picture Award at the American Academy Awards. [MORE] [ADD]

– The Association of Danish Cinemas (DBF) is split into four subdivisions under the umbrella-title of the Joint Association of Danish Cinemas. [MORE] [ADD]

Dominican Republic

– Agliberto Melendez’s Un Pasaje de Ida (One-Way Ticket) is the first feature film produced in the Dominican Republic. [MORE] [ADD]

West Germany

23/2 -

Chinese director Yimou Zhang's Hong gao liang (Red Sorghum) wins the Golden Bear at this year's Berlin Film Festival.   An honorary Golden Bear is awarded to Alec Guinness. [MORE] [ADD]

27/11 -

Over 300 million viewers watch the televised coverage of the first European Oscars from the Theatre des Westerns in Berlin.   Krzysztof Kieslowski's Krótki film o zabijaniu (A Short Film About Killing) is voted Best Film. [MORE] [ADD]

Dec -

Terry Gilliam’s flamboyant version of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is released. [MORE] [ADD]

Greece

27/9 -

The EEC adopt the text of a European audio-visual charter under the aegis of the European Year of Cinema and Television to assert the rights of film and television writers. [MORE] [ADD]

Holland

27/10 -

George Sluizer's terrifying thriller of obsession, Spoorloos (The Vanishing), is released.   Gene Bervoets stars as a man who becomes obsessed with discovering the fate of his girlfriend, who went missing at a motorway service station. [MORE] [ADD]

Hong Kong

– The censor demands more than 30 cuts to Lawrence Ah Mon’s naturalistic Triad drama, Gangs. [MORE] [ADD]

India

2/6 -

Raj Kapoor, one of the biggest Indian movie stars of the 20^th Century, dies in New Delhi at the age of 63. [MORE] [ADD]

Japan

16/7 -

Katsuhio Ôtomo's $10 million feature-length anime Akira, based on his own comic book series, is released. [MORE] [ADD]

– Shochiku-Fuji, local distributors of Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor yield to a barrage of protests from Bertolucci and film critics after they cut newsreel footage of Japanese atrocities committed at the Nanking Massacre in China.  [MORE] [ADD]

South Korea

– Domestic film makers unite to request exhibitors not to screen American imports in an effort to control its own film market. [MORE] [ADD]

Laos

– Bouadeng, Laos’s second feature film is released.   Directed by Som Ok Southiphonh, the film features actors from the Central Drama Spoken Troupe and tells the story of a family torn apart by civil war. [MORE] [ADD]

– The Cinema Department is abolished and replaced by the State Cinematographic Company which concentrates solely on the distribution of foreign films and management of cinemas. [MORE] [ADD]

Spain

23/3 -

Pedro Almodovar’s Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown) is released.   Carmen Maura stars as a woman in search of the unknowing father of her unborn child, who has dumped her by leaving a message on her answerphone. [MORE] [ADD]

Turkey

– The Cinema Actors Association (SODER) is founded. [MORE] [ADD]

Vietnam

– The General Film Enterprise (Xí Nghiệp Phim Tổng Hợp) reverts to its original name - Giải Phóng (Liberation) Film Studio (Hãng Phim Giải Phóng). [MORE] [ADD]