DOG DAYS

It's a perverse fact of life that home video gets the late-summer blues right around February. This year there's a long stretch of VCR ennui between the big holiday videos (Terminator 2) and the spring barrage of more serious films that were in theaters last fall (The Doctor). But the lack of new ''A'' titles doesn't mean there won't be a whole lot of renting going on. In fact, two movies that got lost in the summer shuffle are primed to take advantage of the video downtime. Bingo (1991, Columbia TriStar, $92.95, PG) seems to be a made- to-order weekend rental for kids, and Don't Tell Mom The Babysitter's Dead (1991, HBO, $94.99, PG-13) courts teenage viewers with a vengeance. Ironically, both movies turn out to be well suited to these inverse dog days: They're both dogs. Bingo even stars one. You're thinking, perhaps, that fuzzy-animal flicks are foolproof. Fifteen minutes of Bingo should disabuse you of the notion: This is one cynical critter cash-in. Not to blame Bingo, a friendly-looking mongrel (in cross- shedding Lassie tradition, she plays a he). But everything else about this Incredible Journey knockoff feels third-rate, uninspired, even cruel. After fleeing a traveling circus, Bingo befriends Chuckie (Robert J. Steinmiller Jr., a pasty mouth-breather who may be the least appealing kiddie actor to come along since Problem Child's Michael Oliver). Sensitive Chuckie is despised by his pro footballer dad and thuggy jock brother, and when Dad gets traded to Green Bay, Bingo hits the road in pursuit of his misfit pal. It's a trip fraught with painfully unfunny adventures, including one horrific set piece about a diner owner who grinds stray pooches into hot-dog meat. More bothersome, though, is that Bingo gives kids an awful message about animals. Over and over, we see Bingo act and get treated as if he were human. He skateboards, he drives a truck, he dials 911, he testifies in court, he's hired on as a restaurant dishwasher. Yeah, it's supposed to be cute, but the subtext is that dogs are just little people in fur suits; anyone who really loves animals will tell you how wrong headed that is. Dogs is dogs, as your own kids will find out when they send the family pup downhill on a skateboard. There's a dog in Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead, too; a gang of - heavy-metal teens get it stoned in one har-dee-har scene. Just as Bingo is content to be stupid on the assumption that kids don't know any better, Babysitter panders to the mall generation with a lot of sure-I'm-jaded-but- only-because-nobody-understands-me posturing.

Here's the setup: A selfish L.A. mom leaves her five children in the care of a wizened biddy who promptly dies in her sleep. The oldest kid, Sue Ellen (Christina Applegate), fakes up a resume and gets a job-wow, just like that!-as an executive assistant to a fashion-company VP with truly ugly hair, played by Joanna Cassidy (Who Framed Roger Rabbit). After many farcical close calls, Sue Ellen gets a guy, teaches her bratty siblings responsibility, and- neat!-saves the company's neck with a poolside fashion show of her own. What's weird is how darkly this is all presented. Despite that cowabunga title and the presence of Applegate (Married With Children's resident jailbait and a better actress than you might expect), Babysitter isn't much of a party. As Sue Ellen deals with sleazy coworkers and menial housekeeping, the message is clear: Adulthood makes you mean. Or, as she puts it, ''It's the rat race, and it sucks.'' If the filmmakers had pushed that pouty self-pity a little further, Babysitter might have been interestingly acrid. But, as with Bingo, not much thought has gone into this project beyond a title and a ''surefire'' concept. The lesson of these dog-day woofers may be that this is the time to investigate shelves in the video store other than the new-titles rack. Bingo: D- Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead: D+

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