I don't have a solution for you. But it looks to me this can be described as a form of screen tearing. There was another post recently from a Linux Mint Cinnamon user that he could see only the "File" menu after the VM was open but he was able to change the VM settings before powering on the VM. So it might be worthwhile to check for solution in Mint forums as it might be a problem with Mint in general rather than VMware Player itself.
For whatever it is worth, these are what I see in VMware Player 12.5.5. on Ubuntu.
The top menu items are File - Virtual Machine - Help
Those with keyboard short-cuts
Under File
Ctrl+N - Create new virtual machine
Ctrl+O - Open a virtual machine
Ctrl+P - Player Preferences
Ctrl+Q - Quit
Under Virtual Machine
Ctrl+D - Virtual Machine Settings
Ctrl+Alt+Return - Enter full screen
Under Help
F1 - Help
There are other items under Virtual Machines that are important but don't have keyboard shortcuts. Removable Devices (to connect/disconnect host USB devices to/from VM) and Install/Reinstall VMware Tools (to install video, sound drivers and other drivers/tools).
