Free Videos at Stores? Check ‘em Out

Public libraries have been checking out free videos for years. Now a video-store chain is doing the same.

On July 4, Blockbuster Video’s stores in the Los Angeles area began offering more than 40 informational titles for free check-out to anyone with a store membership (which is also free).

Among the tapes available: “When Mom and Dad Break Up,” Dr. Henry Heimlich’s “Home First Aid,” “Crime Prevention in the Home” and cassettes on alcoholism, back pain, CPR, drugs, nutrition, fire safety, smoking, self-defense and other subjects.

While there are no Blockbuster stores within the city limits of Los Angeles, the chain operates in Torrance, Hawthorne, Lakewood, Bellflower, Whittier, Arcadia, Ontario and several other communities in the area. Check your local yellow pages.

THIS WEEK’S MOVIES

“Cocoanuts” (MCA, $19.95) tumbled into movie theaters 60 years ago, revolutionizing film comedy. The first Marx Brothers picture, this very early talkie is also their most crudely made--the zany musical comedy’s almost as stagebound as the Broadway production from which it’s derived. Creaky though the filming and some of the musical numbers may be, “Cocoanuts” is not to be missed by anyone who’s a sucker for the Marxes’ wild punches. Groucho, as the manager of a Florida resort hotel, holds the movie’s classic auction, torments Margaret Dumont, is tormented himself by Chico in the “viaduct/why a duck” scene, and so (hilariously) on.

Other old films out this week:

“Diary of a Chambermaid” (Republic, $19.95, 1946), one of Jean Renoir’s American films (remade more ironically by Luis Bunuel in 1964) features a script by co-star Burgess Meredith (Paulette Goddard plays the saucy servant); “The Key” (RCA/Columbia, $69.95, 1958), a World War II love story starring William Holden and Sophia Loren that’s too somber and static despite the direction of the great Carol Reed; “The Glass Key” (MCA, $29.95, 1942), an atmospheric Dashiell Hammett adaptation with Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake; “A Dandy in Aspic” (RCA/Columbia, $69.95, 1968), a confusing spy melodrama with an interesting cast (including Mia Farrow and Lionel Stander) and completed by star Laurence Harvey after the death of director Anthony Mann, and “Affair in Trinidad” (RCA/Columbia, $69.95, 1952), which reunited Glenn Ford and Rita Hayworth, the stars of the great 1946 film noir “Gilda.”

More recent fare:

“Dangerous Liaisons” (Warner, $89.95, R) could be subtitled “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Circa the Late 18th Century.” Its own French rascals are played by Glenn Close and John Malkovich, and the sexual power games we’re invited to laugh at include the rape of a 15-year-old girl. While the morality may be questionable, many critics praised this risky, risque and rakish 1988 interpretation of the 200-year-old novel “Les Liaisons Dangereuses”--or at least loved the costumes.

“Talk Radio” (MCA, $89.95, R) is director Oliver Stone’s and actor/writer/performance artist Eric Bogosian’s plunge into the dark world of an abusive late-night shock-radio personality.

“True Believer” (RCA/Columbia, $89.95, R) stars James Woods as a cynical attorney who joins an idealistic young associate (Robert Downey Jr.) to investigate whether an innocent man may have been convicted of murder.

“Who’s Harry Crumb?” (RCA/Columbia, $89.95, PG-13) offers John Candy as a bumbling detective. Critics found it’s silliness unfunny and moaned once more over the great Candy’s poor choice of scripts.

“Physical Evidence” (Vestron, $89.98, R) has Burt Reynolds as a tough cop out to clear his name in a murder case and Theresa Russell as his attorney.

OTHER NEW VIDEOS

“Minute Movie Masterpieces” (Rhino, $14.95, 30 minutes) takes 30 classic, public-domain films (“The Lady Vanishes,” “It’s a Wonderful Life,” etc.) and speedily summarizes them. It’s fun for a while, but since the alternating male and female narrators stick to real plots and add few comic asides, the approach isn’t irreverently humorous in the way other “Fractured Flicker”-type cut-ups (like “Mad Movies”) are.

Kathy Smith’s Pregnancy Workout” (Media, $29.95, 90 minutes) was completed shortly before the popular exerciser’s own child was delivered. “Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood” (Republic, $19.95, 58 minutes) is a collection of vintage theatrical shorts in which the columnist invades the homes, workplaces and playgrounds of Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Gary Cooper (who’s seen shooting birds with Ernest Hemingway) and other stars.

It’s either great or poor timing, but Public Enemy--one of the most controversial, political and musically powerful rap groups--broke up noisily just two weeks before the release of its first video, “Public Enemy: Fight the Power--Live” (CMV, $19.98, 60 minutes). Also new from CMV: “Branford Marsalis: Steep” ($19.98, 90 minutes), which documents the jazz saxophonist onstage and backstage.

For the kids: Two new $14.95 additions to the Media/Fisher Price “Grimm’s Fairy Tales” series are “Briar Rose” (25 minutes) a sleeping-beauty story, and “The Golden Goose” (22 minutes), all about a special bird that brings both joy and sorrow to some villagers. And “Columbia Pictures Cartoons Starring Mr. Magoo” (Magic Window, $19.95, 55 minutes) offers eight cartoons featuring the nearsighted comic character and the voice of the late Jim Backus.