OUT ON VIDEO

A weekly update of video releases

* F FOR FAKE - In his last major film, completed in 1975, former magician Orson Welles plunged into the world of fakes, frauds, and forgeries, spinning a dizzying web of tales-within-tales focusing on trickery in art, literature, and cinema itself. The real-life characters include everyone from Elmyr de Hory, whose forged paintings allegedly hang in great galleries and museums, to Clifford Irving, whose bogus biography of billionaire Howard Hughes caused an uproarious scandal in its day. Welles's storytelling tricks are less persuasive than the hoaxes he documents, but he's an affable master of ceremonies, and his quicker-than-the-eye editing makes its own wry commentary on film as a form of deception. (Not rated; Home Vision Cinema)

* THE MANGLER - Chaos is created by the most unlikely villain in ages: a haunted ironing machine in an industrial laundry, which demands human sacrifices from the corrupt old capitalist who runs the place. Tobe Hooper's directing career has been in decline since the popular ''Poltergeist,'' but this over-the-top chiller shows he still has a brawny visual imagination. Also present is his propensity for gratuitous gore, putting the picture way off limits for the squeamish. Based on a story by Stephen King, who has his own weakness for mayhem. Robert Englund, of the ''Nightmare on Elm Street'' movies, heads the cast. (Not rated; New Line Home Video)

* ORLANDO - Virginia Woolf's superbly sardonic novel inspired Sally Potter's film about an English aristocrat who lives through a number of historical ages, passing the age of 400 and changing from a man to a woman along the way. The purpose of the satire is to question common-sense social conventions based on rigid definitions of gender. Potter's sensuous filmmaking style and Tilda Swinton's slyly humorous performance are what make the movie delightful as well as provocative, at least until its oddly unpersuasive conclusion. Billy Zane, John Wood, and Quentin Crisp are among the supporting players. (PG-13; Columbia TriStar Home Video)

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