Cat & Canary; The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash And Other Stories

Two new releases from Weston Woods' public performance video line and their "home video" line point to a problem we mentioned last issue concerning PBS Video. But, first the tapes. Cat & Canary, based on Michael Foreman's charming picture book uses enhanced iconographic animation to tell the story of unlikely best friends who have a very bizarre day. When the master of the house leaves each morning, cat opens canary's cage, the pair have breakfast together, and then retire to the roof of the apartment complex where cat enjoys watching canary fly. On this particular day, however, cat finds a tangled kite on the roof, manages to free it and--neglecting to take his claws out of the string first--finds himself taking an unexpected journey over the city. a cute tale about friendship and how stereotypes are often misleading. For ages 4-9.The second video, The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash and Other Stories is a compilation of four earlier Weston Woods titles for "home video" (i.e., they cannot be used in children's story hours, for example). The tape leads off with the Michael Sporn-directed title piece, a CINE Golden Eagle award-winning tale of an extremely odd field trip to a farm where Jimmy's pet boa constrictor is responsible for a series of comic events leading, among other things, to the young female narrator's lunch being eaten by a pig on board the school bus. Also included on the tape are the CINE Golden Eagle award-winning The Great White Man-Eating Shark--a Cautionary Tale, based on the picture book written by Margaret Mahy and illustrated by Jonathan Allen. In this wonderfully weird tale, a young boy named Norvin, who resembles a shark, and hates sharing the water with the other swimmers at Caramel Cove, puts a fin on his back and effectively clears out the pool, so to speak. Eventually the swimmers return, and Norvin has to do his Jaws imitation again, only this type he convinces not only his fellow swimmers, but a female shark as well, who falls head over tail fin in love. Not personally carcharodon-inclined, Norvin discovers that selfishness doesn't necessarily pay. And in Fourteen Cats & a Rat-Catcher, written by James Cressey and illustrated by Tamasin Cole, a family of rats and an old woman mutually loathe one another...passively, until the old woman hires a rat catcher, and the head rat meets the elderly gent at the bargaining table to strike a deal. The other title on the tape is James Stevenson's Monty, which astute readers will recall was reviewed in our 3/94 issue, where the public performance version of the title (at $60) was highly praised. It's still a great film, but now it's available for $14.95 with three other shorts to boot (but without public performance rights). We placed a call to Weston Woods about the very brief window between the public performance and home video versions of Monty, and were told that there is generally a 1-2 year delay between the two; however, Monty was an older title purchased from Michael Sporn. That explanation doesn't help you the reader a whole lot if you've already sprung for the $60 Monty but didn't need the public performance rights version. Still, the Weston Woods publicist, who was very understanding, said that she'd pass our concerns along. The bottom line is that we'll continue to watch for variable pricing and warn you when there's a difference. For ages 4-9.Cat & Canary is highly recommended for larger children's video collections. The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash and Other Stories is highly recommended and an Editor's Choice. (R. Pitman)