Out on Video
FUN & FANCY FREE
More than 50 years ago, the Walt Disney studio planned a pair of full-length animations on family-friendly subjects: one featuring the most popular Disney personalities - Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and Goofy - in a comic version of "Jack and the Beanstalk," and another based on a Sinclair Lewis story about Bongo, a circus bear who falls in love. But wartime cutbacks caused the projects to be shortened and combined into a single 1947 release, joined by a live-action sequence starring ventriloquist Edgar Bergen. The results are everything the title promises, enhanced with toe-tapping music by Dinah Shore and others. (G; Walt Disney Home Video)
OSCAR PETERSON: MUSIC IN THE KEY OF OSCAR - A filmed biography of the musician some would nominate as the most virtuosic piano player in jazz history. Much of the concert footage comes from recent years, when Peterson reassembled his legendary trio with guitarist Herb Ellis and bassist Ray Brown, each a top-level master in his own right. But there are also tantalizing visits to bygone gigs in the United States and Europe as well as Montreal, where Peterson established his stardom in an atmosphere less tainted by racism than the US music scene. The history of that racism provides a somber accompaniment to this otherwise upbeat movie. Interviews with the trio's members, plus other jazz greats and commentators, round out the lively package. (Not rated; VIEW Video)
THE SEVENTH VEIL
British classic about a musically gifted young woman who develops her talent under the strict, often frightening discipline of an eccentric guardian. The big question is whether she'll reach the summit of her art before losing her sanity or even her life. Ann Todd is fine as the pianist, and James Mason is brilliant as her mentor, at once so smooth and sinister that you often don't know what to make of him. Herbert Lom heads the supporting cast as the heroine's sympathetic psychiatrist. Compton Bennett directed this music-filled 1945 drama, which predates "Shine" by more than half a century. (Not rated; Hallmark Home Entertainment)
