`Dick Tracy,' `Longtime Companion' Are Coming To Town This Month

Last summer's most ballyhooed Hollywood movie (``Dick Tracy'') and its least deserving flop (``Gremlins 2: The New Batch'') are new this month on videocassette.

Also making their debuts are a couple of films, ``Longtime Companion'' and ``Last Exit to Brooklyn,'' which may figure in year-end awards, and Kenneth Branagh's remake of Shakespeare's ``Henry V,'' which received Oscar nominations last spring for Branagh's direction and his performance in the title role.

The list of theatrical releases starts off with the Tuesday release of Disney's juvenile Jim Varney comedy, ``Ernest Goes to Jail.'' Joe Dante's ``Gremlins'' sequel, which turned out to be wittier and less gruesome than the original, turns up Wednesday.

``Henry V'' makes its video debut Thursday, along with the tasteless Dabney Coleman comedy, ``Short Time''; the initially X-rated midnight movie, ``Frankenhooker''; the violent Cheryl Ladd thriller, ``Lisa''; the moronic Bill Cosby comedy, ``Ghost Dad''; and three shoestring-budget films from writer-director Henry Jaglom: ``Can She Bake a Cherry Pie?'' which is essentially a one-woman show for Karen Black; ``Tracks,'' starring Dennis Hopper as a disoriented Vietnam veteran; and Jaglom's most recent and charming film, ``New Year's Day,'' in which Jaglom spends the holiday trying to move into a New York apartment that's already occupied.

Pedro Almodovar's ``Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!'', a relatively tame Spanish sex comedy that was originally X-rated, will be released Dec. 12. It was recently given an NC-17 rating and is regarded as a test case for the new classification. It's the same film that got an X not so many months ago; no cuts were made to qualify for the new rating. The influential Blockbuster Video chain has a policy of not carrying X-rated films, but it will consider NC-17 films on a case-by-case basis.

``Robocop 2,'' a derivative and extremely violent sequel that became one of last summer's box-office losers, arrives Dec. 13. Sandra Bernhard's challenging, funny-peculiar one-woman show, ``Without You I'm Nothing,'' turns up Dec. 19, along with ``Last Exit to Brooklyn,'' a grim slum drama distinguished by Jennifer Jason Leigh's performance as a 1950s prostitute.

Warren Beatty's over-hyped and under-written ``Dick Tracy'' is also due Dec. 19. The Disney studio reportedly spent about $50 million just to promote Beatty's cartoonish version of the comic strip (the movie itself cost somewhat less than that), and it will need the cassette market to recoup.

The month winds up with the post-Christmas releases of two more summer movies: ``Longtime Companion,'' the moving AIDS drama that won considerable acclaim for Bruce Davison's performance as a wealthy man whose life is destroyed by the virus, and ``My Blue Heaven,'' a much-panned Steve Martin comedy about a mob informant who relocates to a small California town.

Although none of these is priced to sell (and ``Dick Tracy'' is priced at a whopping $93), it's a busy month for oldies making their cassette debuts.

Beginning Wednesday, MGM/UA Home Video has eight new $20 tapes: Grace Kelly's ``The Swan,'' the late Ava Gardner in ``The Barefoot Contessa,'' Bob Hope and Bing Crosby in ``The Road to Hong Kong,'' Jean Harlow in ``Bombshell,'' Joan Crawford in ``Humoresque,'' Shirley MacLaine and Audrey Hepburn in William Wyler's 1961 remake of ``The Children's Hour,'' and two Vincente Minnelli movies: ``The Clock,'' a wartime classic with Judy Garland and Robert Walker, and ``The Long, Long Trailer,'' a pleasant 1954 marital comedy starring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.

----------------------------------------------

This week's new videotapes, laserdiscs:

Monday - ``Into the Snow Zone.''

Tuesday - Jim Varney in ``Ernest Goes to Jail.''

Wednesday - Zach Galligan in ``Gremlins 2: The New Batch,'' Martha Plimpton in ``Silence Like Glass,'' Shelley Duvall's ``Rock N Rhymeland,'' Mike Farrell in ``Dark River - A Father's Revenge,'' Louis Gossett Jr. in ``El Diablo,'' Grace Kelly in ``The Swan,'' Lucille Ball in ``The Long Long Trailer,'' Shirley MacLaine in ``The Children's Hour,'' Judy Garland in ``The Clock,'' Ava Gardner in ``The Barefoot Contessa,'' Bob Hope in ``The Road to Hong Kong,'' Jean Harlow in ``Bombshell,'' Joan Crawford in ``Humoresque,'' ``Terror Rules the Ring.''

Thursday - Kenneth Branagh in ``Henry V,'' Dabney Coleman in ``Short Time,'' Cheryl Ladd in ``Lisa,'' Richard Widmark in ``Kiss of Death,'' Jack Palance in ``Panic in the Streets,'' Edward G. Robinson in ``Seven Thieves,'' Louise Lasser in ``Frankenhooker,'' Susan Hayward in ``House of Strangers,'' Bill Cosby in ``Ghost Dad,'' Marc Singer in ``High Desert Kill,'' Rosanna Arquette in ``Almost,'' Henry Jaglom's ``New Year's Day,'' Karen Black in ``Can She Bake a Cherry Pie?,'' Dennis Hopper in ``Tracks,'' Sophia Loren in ``Running Away,'' Max Von Sydow in ``Hiroshima,'' Jeff Fahey in ``The Serpent of Death,'' ``Memories of Hollywood,'' ``Rupert, Rupert and the Runaway Dragon,'' ``My Family and Other Animals.''

New laserdiscs: Richard Dreyfuss in ``Close Encounters of the Third Kind'' (letterbox edition), Eddie Murphy in ``Another 48 HRs.,'' Mel Gibson in ``Bird on a Wire,'' Laurence Olivier in ``King Lear,'' Akira Kurosawa's ``Ikiru.''