What’s Hot

* Last week’s Top 5 VHS rentals:

1. “The Green Mile” (1999). Though its Stephen King story is a good one, this Frank Darabont-written and -directed version is hampered by excessive length, the suffocating deliberateness of its pace and some truly stomach-turning moments. Even Tom Hanks’ compelling performance as the head guard on death row in a 1935 Louisiana prison can’t overcome that. (Kenneth Turan, Dec. 10) R for violence, language and some sex-related material.

2. “The Talented Mr. Ripley” (1999). This Anthony Minghella-directed version of the Patricia Highsmith novel about an amoral wannabe (Matt Damon) who worms his way into the good graces of clueless U.S. expatriates (Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow) in 1950s Europe is unexpectedly lacking in emotional impact. (Turan, Dec. 24) R for violence, language and brief nudity.

3. “Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo” (1999). Rob Schneider is the latest “Saturday Night Live” veteran to get a “doofus feature” of his very own. He plays a softhearted, softheaded fish-tank cleaner forced to become what some would call a “professional escort” and others--well, anyway, the movie is about what you’d expect. (Gene Seymour, Dec. 10) R for sexual content, language and crude humor.

4. “Hanging Up” (2000). The idea of Meg Ryan coping with her irascible dying father (Walter Matthau), a phone addict, and two-self-absorbed sisters (Diane Keaton, who also directed, and Lisa Kudrow), sounds promising as a serious comedy, but the father and the sisters are so unlikable and the relationships so underdeveloped that the result is synthetic and contrived. (Kevin Thomas, Feb. 18) PG-13 for language and some sex-related material.

5. “Girl, Interrupted” (1999). Susanna Kaysen’s exceptional memoir of two years spent in a mental institution is graced by exceptional leading performances by Winona Ryder and Academy Award-winner Angelina Jolie but held back by a plot that verges on the manufactured. (Turan, Dec. 21) R for strong language and content relating to drugs, sexuality and suicide.

* Last week’s Top 5 DVD rentals:

1. “The Talented Mr. Ripley”

2. “Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo”

3. “Green Mile”

4. “Hanging Up”

5. “Bicentennial Man” (1999). Robin Williams gives a touching performance as a robot who gradually transforms into a human being in this romantic but overly glossy sci-fi fable. Directed by Chris Columbus. (Kevin Thomas, Dec. 17) PG for language and some sexual content.

* Last week’s Top 5 VHS sellers

1. “Runaway Bride (1999)”. Though it’s fun to see Richard Gere and Julia Roberts smooching on screen for the first time in nine years, the flawed and unpleasant conception of a woman who abandons men at the altar crossing swords with a misogynist newspaperman will leave viewers with an unavoidably sour taste. (Turan, July 30) PG for language and some suggestive dialogue.

2. “American Pie” (special edition) (1999). An unexpected hybrid of “South Park” and Andy Hardy that uses its surface crudeness as sucker bait to entice teenagers into the tent to see a high school movie that is sweet and sincere at heart. With a cast of likable young people. (Turan, July 9) R for strong sexuality, crude sexual dialogue, language and drinking, all involving teens.

3. “Stuart Little” (1999). The shy and pleasant mouse of E.B. White’s famous children’s book has been turned into a rodent whose ready line of patter would make him at home on “The Tonight Show.” The computer animation is excellent. (Turan, Dec. 17) PG for brief language.

4. “The World Is Not Enough” (1999). James Bond is back for the 19th time, with Pierce Brosnan effortlessly reprising his splendid take on Agent 007. Not so effortless for the viewer is trying to keep track of a murky plot. (Thomas, Nov. 19) PG-13 for intense sequences of violence, some sexuality and innuendo.

5. “Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace” (1999). Though this prequel to the original “Star Wars” trilogy is certainly serviceable, it’s noticeably lacking in warmth and humor. Its visual strengths are considerable, but from a dramatic point of view it’s ponderous and plodding. (Turan, May 18, 1999) PG for sci-fi action/violence.

* Last week’s Top 5 DVD sellers

1. “Independence Day” (1996). Mean, marauding aliens hit planet Earth planning to take no prisoners. Spectacular special effects are joined to a cardboard story line that exactly reproduces the fatuous sensibility of the 1950s. (Turan) PG-13, for sci-fi destruction and violence.

2. “Green Mile”

3. “The Talented Mr. Ripley”

4. “The Matrix”

5. “Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo”

What’s New

In stores this week:

* All About My Mother (1999). Spain’s Pedro Almodovar presents a surprisingly satisfying combination of bawdy sexual humor, genuine emotion and melodramatic plot mechanics excessive enough to include a heroin-addicted lesbian actress, a pregnant nun and a transvestite father with AIDS. In Spanish with English subtitles. Academy Award winner for best foreign-language film. (Kenneth Turan, Nov. 24) Columbia TriStar: no list price; DVD, $29.95; (CC). R for sexuality, including strong sexual dialogue, language and some drug content.

Boiler Room (2000). Giovanni Ribisi shines as a college dropout driven to get rich by greed and a misguided desire to please his dad. But this sometimes intriguing look at the sleazy New York brokerage firm suffers in comparison to the better films (“Wall Street,” “Glengarry Glen Ross”) that it constantly evokes. (Eric Harrison, Feb. 18) New Line/Warner: no list price; DVD, $24.98; (CC). R for strong language and some drug content.

Down to You (2000). Freddie Prinze Jr. and Julia Stiles shine as young lovers who fall for each other more passionately and faster than they are prepared for. But writer-director Kris Isaacson tells their story awkwardly, and it draws too much from other movies rather than from life itself. (Kevin Thomas, Jan. 22) Miramax/Buena Vista: no list price; DVD, $29.99; (CC). PG-13 for mature thematic material, sexual content, language, drug and alcohol use.

Mansfield Park (1999). A subversive, nontraditional reading of Jane Austen’s least-appealing novel, in which writer-director Patricia Rozema turns humble Fanny Price into a self-consciously clever and politically correct version of Austen herself. Though it’s never dull, it has too much of its own agenda and too little of Austen’s to completely succeed. (Turan, Nov. 18) Miramax/Buena Vista: no list price; DVD, $29.99; (CC). PG-13 for brief, violent images, sexual content and drug use.

My Dog Skip (2000). Based on Willie Morris’ 1995 memoir, this film is a standard-issue Hollywood family film about a boy (Frankie Muniz) and his dog growing up in a small town during World War II. It’s a little too glossy and Skip is a bit too much the trained performer, but young Muniz is good. (Thomas, Jan. 12) Warner: $22.96; DVD, $24.98; (CC). PG for some violent content and mild language.

* Onegin (1999). A triumphant film adaptation of the Alexander Pushkin novel starring Ralph Fiennes as a jaded St. Petersburg playboy who discovers he’s in love too late. It is an exquisite period piece with flawless ensemble performances by Fiennes, Liv Tyler. (Thomas, Dec. 17) Sterling: no list price; DVD, $29.95; (CC). Unrated: Adult themes and situations.

What’s Coming

Tuesday: “The Whole Nine Yards,” “Angela’s Ashes,” “What Planet Are You From?” “Isn’t She Great,” “The Ninth Gate,” “Rosetta,” “Ride With the Devil,” “The Big Tease,” “Diamonds” and “The War Zone.”

July 25: “The Beach,” “Drowning Mona” and “Magnolia.”

Aug. 1: “Romeo Must Die” and “Whatever It Takes.”

Aug. 8: “The Grandfather,” “Holy Smoke,” “Map of the World” and “Reindeer Games.”

Commentary by Times critics.

Rental video charts provided by VSDA

VidTrac, sales charts by VideoScan Inc.