Seeking Out the Movie Performances of Geraldine Page; ‘The Stepfather,’ an Acclaimed Thriller, Due Out Aug. 26

If you go to a video store in search of movies featuring Geraldine Page, who died last weekend, you’re likely to be disappointed. Not only is there little available, little of what’s there is very good.

Embassy’s “The Trip to Bountiful,” which won her a best actress Oscar last year, is the most prominent example of the Page art available on home video. However, in some film circles, the feeling was that she was being honored--like Paul Newman winning for “The Color of Money”--for past work.

In this tear-jerker, about the odyssey of lonely old widow to her home in Bountiful, Tex., Page pulls out all the stops and uses every trick in her considerable repertoire. At times, she overcomes the weaknesses of the material and moves you through the sheer force of her talent. But you never really forget that she’s acting. This isn’t a movie; it’s an acting lesson.

Page turns in an even better performance in a worse movie, Paramount’s 1982 “I’m Dancing as Fast as I Can” about a documentary film maker (Jill Clayburgh) who’s battling Valium addiction. In this disjointed melodrama, Page is brilliant as a proud poet-teacher dying of cancer. Her performance in “Bountiful” is mannered, but this one isn’t. Without using obvious devices or resorting to cheaply sentimental touches, Page burrows to the core of this woman and craftily exposes it.

MGM/UA’s “Interiors” isn’t much either. In this 1978 movie, writer-director Woody Allen, creating his first real drama, winds up imitating the austere, somber style of Swedish director Ingmar Bergman. The principal characters are a family of miserable, mixed-up, frustrated people. You’ll probably get bored with this bunch very quickly. Page’s stylized performance may be her worst screen effort. But Allen is more to blame than she is.

Page is also on display in other undistinguished movies, such as MCA’s “The Beguiled” (1971), Warner’s “You’re a Big Boy Now” (1966) and MGM/UA’s “The Pope of Greenwich Village” (1984).

At some point, “Summer and Smoke” (1961) and “Sweet Bird of Youth” (1962), will make their home video debuts. These feature her two finest screen performances--both, by the way, as neurotic Tennessee Williams’ heroines. Some historians rank her Adrianna Del Lago, the burned-out actress in “Sweet Bird,” among the all-time great movie performances by an actress.

So Page fans in the home video market will have to be content with her good and so-so efforts until the real gems are available.

COMING MOVIES: Embassy’s “The Stepfather,” which some critics are already calling the thriller of the year, is due out Aug. 26. Terry O’Quinn and Shelley Hack co-star. MCA’s “Brighton Beach Memoirs,” the Neil Simon comedy, debuts Aug. 13. The release date of Warner’s “Over the Top,” Sylvester Stallone’s arm-wrestling movie, has been upped to Aug. 19.

NEW RELEASES: HBO’s “Hannah and Her Sisters,” Woody Allen’s critically acclaimed box-office smash, will undoubtedly be his biggest home-video hit ever. It’s a complex family comedy-drama focusing on the assorted relationships of Hannah (Mia Farrow) and her sisters (Barbara Hershey and Dianne Wiest). Allen plays a TV writer-producer who’s not only Hannah’s ex-husband but is also dating one of her sisters (Wiest). Meanwhile, Hannah’s husband (Michael Caine) is fooling around with her other sister (Hershey).

While savoring the performances that won Caine and Wiest best-supporting Oscars, don’t overlook Hershey’s performance, which is the best of her career. Critics rank this one with “Manhattan” and “Annie Hall” as being among Allen’s finest movies.

The main attraction of Warner Bros.’ “ ‘Round Midnight” is the performance that earned jazzman Dexter Gordon a best-actor nomination. He plays a veteran tenor-sax great who’s deteriorating due to the ravages of booze and night life. He’s a lumbering gentle giant with a voice that sounds like it’s soaked in whisky.

Directed by Bertrand Tavernier, the movie, set in Paris in 1959, is about a friendship between the sax player and a reverential fan (Francois Cluzet). Jazz fans, who’ll be in tune with both Gordon’s character and Herbie Hancock’s marvelous Oscar-winning score, will appreciate this one most. The tone is solemn and the pace is slow. A long, rambling ode to expatriate jazzmen, it’s short on plot but long on atmosphere.

Warner’s “Little Shop of Horrors” is a fun, frisky musical--a tuneful spoof of low-budget sci-fi movies--that was a hit with critics and fans. At the end of the ‘50s, a wimpy clerk (Rick Moranis) in a Skid-Row flower shop stumbles onto man-eating plant from outer space. The greedy plant helps keep him his mind off his pitiful love life. He’s pining away for a co-worker--played by Ellen Greene as a blond-bimbo caricature--who’s turned on by a sadistic dentist (Steve Martin).

Martin got rave notices, but the most riveting character is the sassy, jive-talking plant, Audrey II, whose voice is provided by Levi Stubbs of the Four Tops. Directed by Frank Oz, this musical is adapted from a Off Broadway play that’s based on a Roger Corman B-movie. Bill Murray and John Candy have funny cameo roles.

OLD MOVIES: The release of “ ‘Round Midnight” has inspired video companies to put out two old movies about jazzmen:

The best thing about Warner’s “Young Man With a Horn” (1950, $19.98), a tawdry melodrama about a tormented trumpet player, is Lauren Bacall, in one of her finest sultry-shrew performances. Her rival for the affections of the trumpet player (Kirk Douglas) is a wholesome singer played by Doris Day, who sings several songs in that alluringly wispy style. Guess who gets the trumpet player in the end--the vixen or Miss Wholesome? Douglas has some touching scenes with Juano Hernandez, a black actor who portrays his mentor. Based on the life of Bix Beiderbecke, it was possibly the best Hollywood movie about a jazz musician until “ ‘Round Midnight” came out last year.

According to Hollywood, star trumpet players have to suffer. Sammy Davis Jr. plays another tortured trumpeter in “A Man Called Adam” (1966, Charter Entertainment, $59.95), which features a cast that’s nearly all black. Haunted by a past tragedy and angered by the racist society, the surly musician soaks his misery in booze. The question is whether music and the love of a good woman (Cicely Tyson) can save him. The ending is surprisingly downbeat. One of the best black movies ever made. Not great but features some absorbing sequences. Davis is outstanding.

CHARTS

(Compiled by Billboard magazine)

TOP VIDEOCASSETTES, RENTALS

1--”The Color of Money” (Touchstone).

2--”Children of Lesser God” (Paramount).

3--”Heartbreak Ridge” (Warner).

4--”Peggy Sue Got Married” (CBS-Fox).

TOP VIDEOCASSETTES, SALES

1--”Top Gun” (Paramount).

2--”Jane Fonda’s Low Impact Aerobic Workout” (Lorimar).

3--”Callanetics” (MCA).

4--”Jane Fonda’s New Workout” (Lorimar).