Here Comes Summer And So Are A Raft Of Children's Videos

Just three months after its recent theatrical reissue, Disney's "The Great Mouse Detective" will be released on tape July 17, to be followed by two more Disney cartoon features: "The Rescuers" (September) and the Oscar-winning blockbuster, "Beauty and the Beast" (late October).

They will be priced at $25 apiece, and that's not all Disney is preparing for the summer-fall market. In mid-June, the company will release three new Goofy cassettes ($13 apiece), three more volumes in the "Dinosaurs" series ($13) and a "Be Our Guest Singalong" ($13), including clips and music from "Beauty and the Beast," as well as songs from "Pinocchio," "Mary Poppins," "Sleeping Beauty," "Lady and the Tramp" and "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day."

The July list includes tape reissues of "Darby O'Gill and the Little People" ($20) and "Swiss Family Robinson" ($20), as well as repriced Disney releases including "What About Bob?" ($20).

While Disney is getting more aggressive about lower-priced tapes pitched to children, so are several other companies. Steven Spielberg's "Hook" will most likely to turn up at $25 or under before summer's over, and next week Paramount Home Video will release an animated series, "James Bond Jr." ($10 apiece).

Wood Knapp Video is continuing its popular series of outdoorsy Don Cooper sing-alongs with "Pocket Full of Songs," "Mother Nature Songs" and "Songs of the Wild West" ($15 apiece). Filmed in Montana, the "Wild West" collection is an especially enjoyable roundup of Western music, including, incidentally, "Pony Boy" - a song that turns up on Bruce Springsteen's latest LP, "Lucky Town."

Golden Book Video's latest collection of animated stories includes "The Legend of Paul Bunyan" ($8), "Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel" ($13), and "Madeline's Rescue" ($13), narrated by Christopher Plummer. New from Rabbit Ears Productions are animated versions of "Rumpelstiltskin" ($10), narrated by Kathleen Turner and featuring music by Tangerine Dream, and "Koi and the Kola Nuts" ($10), narrated by Whoopi Goldberg and including a score by Herbie Hancock.

Polygram Video has Bill Harley's latest collection of songs and sketches, "Who Made This Mess" ($15), and a new Shari Lewis cassette, "Don't Wake Your Mom" ($15), that encourages children not only to sing along, but provide sound effects for her storytelling. Another sing-along, "Happy Birdy's Birthday Video Songfest" (V.I.E.W. Video), comes in two versions: a 30-minute tape ($15) and a combination of the tape and a "video party pack" ($20), that includes balloons, candles, postcards and a game.

If your children have seen "Astro Boy" or "Planetbusters" and can't get enough Japanese animation, there's even a local resource for the stuff: The Whole Toon Access Cartoon Company, P.O. Box 369, Issaquah, WA 98027. Their catalog includes English-dubbed films ("Windaria," the "Nadia" series) as well as Japanese-language cartoons with English subtitles ("Twilight of the Cockroaches," "The Humanoid").

Video Watch by John Hartl appears Sundays in Arts & Entertainment. You can get more video information by calling the Seattle Times' 24-hour free service Infoline. Call 464-2000 from any touch-tone telephone and when instructed, enter the category number 7369 to reach the Video Hotline. You may replay all information by pressing "R" (7); back up to previous information by pressing "B" (2); and jump over over current information by pressing "J" (5).

------------------------------ New videos in stores this week ------------------------------

Tuesday - "Stephen King's Golden Years," "Shirley Horn: Here's to Life," "Pink Floyd: La Carrera Panamericana."

Wednesday - Kevin Costner in "JFK," Glenn Close in "Meeting Venus," John Sayles' "City of Hope," Yves Robert's "My Father's Glory" and "My Mother's Castle," Peter Coyote in "Exposure," Colleen Dewhurst in "Termini Station," Gene Hackman in "Company Business," Humphrey Bogart in "All Through the Night," June Allyson in "Battle Circus," Alexis Smith in "Conflict," Eleanor Parker in "Chain Lightning," Barbara Stanwyck in "The Two Mrs. Carrolls," Errol Flynn in "Virginia City," Judith Krantz's "Scruples," Tyrone Power in "The Long Gray Line," double features of "Jet Attack"/"Paratroop Command" and "Suicide Battalion"/"Hell Squad," "Air Combat Collection: The Choppers, The Fighters, The Bombers," Jedda Jones in "Talkin' Dirty After Dark."

Thursday - "Balletcise," Jose Ferrer in "Old Explorers."

Friday - Hideo Gosha's "The Wolves," Jeff Kahn's "Revolution! A Red Comedy," Samy Szlingerbaum's "Brussels Transit," Chantal Akerman's "Akermania" (Vol. One).

New laserdiscs: Pier Paolo Pasolini's "Canterbury Tales," Glenn Close in "Sarah, Plain and Tall," Peter Sellers in "The Bobo" (letterboxed), Rosalind Chao in "Thousand Pieces of Gold," Mick Jagger in "Freejack" (letterboxed), "Nat King Cole (Vol. 2)," Jose Ferrer in "Deep in My Heart."