Tori Amos: Complete Videos: 1991-1998 [VHS]

With her skittering, piano-based melodies, fluttering voice, and penchant for mingling High Romantic imagery with impish surrealism, Tori Amos invites the love-hate relationships that define objects of cult worship. Except that Amos's particular cult long ago reached mass popularity on both sides of the Atlantic, a commercial success borne out by the length and scale of this anthology, which collects all of her music videos to date. For her fans, of course, the package is a commercial slam dunk and instant hit, but even nonbelievers may find themselves mesmerized by these consistently inventive, beautifully shot miniatures.

Like her predecessor, British singer-songwriter Kate Bush, Amos suggests a steely waif: her petite beauty and tremulous songs project a fragility that her artistic nerve and lyric provocations belie. However ethereal her image, Amos brings intense focus to her evident love affair with the camera; pale blue eyes, paler skin, and a nimbus of crimson hair make her a pre-Raphaelite poster girl, but she attacks her close-ups with a directness that anchors most of these clips. It's enough to make you forget the frequent obscurity of those lyrics, which her fans pore over like Holy Writ.

Amos also succeeds in building a visual style as coherent as her lyrics aren't. Although a committee of different directors and cinematographers appears in the credits, the artist has achieved a consistency in the use of simple but striking compositions (often using stark black or white backdrops and cut-out vignettes as framing devices), evocative special effects, and superb cinematography. --Sam Sutherland