Slideshow questions, help!

I think you will have a hard time finding something to replace Proshow Gold.

Thank you for the info Greg, it was very helpful. I enjoy using PSE Elements 13 (I need to upgrade!) and I was hoping I could justify the upgrade by being able to do the slideshow that I wanted to make. I lost my previous slideshow program Proshow Gold which was very easy and intuitive to use, I could do everything I needed and burn a DVD right from there. After 30 years, they have shut down, just this past Jan, so I am hooped. I wanted something as good or better than that and sadly for this type of project, PSE is not it. So I will be have to go with something else. I found your clarifications very helpful, thank you.

First, both Photoshop Elements (PSE) and Premiere Elements (PRE) come with the Elements Organizer (EO). 

The Organizer's Slideshow feature is limited to 250 media files.  (That will create a slideshow of about 20 minutes, so you may want to reconsider whether you need more than that.)  There are 6 different themes that are available with different kinds of transitions and backgrounds.  One of them is a pan and zoom theme.  You can add your own music to the slideshow.  You can also change the order of the photos.  But other than that there is very little customization, and you cannot change e.g. the transitions or how the pan and zoom operates on each photo.

For a totally customized slideshow you would need PRE.  This has the ability to create many different kinds of transitions between slides, customized pan and zoom and all kinds of other movements and rotations.  (There is a tool to create automatic P&Z for faces in an image.  The video will pan between the faces in an image.)  And, of course, you can add your own music (and even remix the music to fit the length of the video).  However, that can be a lot of work.  Given your short time to create the project, it may be overwhelming.

One other point about creating a DVD.  If you only want to save a video file to a DVD that can be played on a computer, you should have no problem with either PSE or PRE.  But if you want to create a true DVD that is playable on a TV from a set-top DVD player, you will have to use PRE.  Or else use another disc authoring program.

But instead of listening to me, you can try out both programs to see which suits your needs.  You can get a 30 day free trial here.