Forecast

Dinosaur looks to make the competition extinct this weekend. Reports have it costing Disney anywhere from $130 - 200 million to make. An extra $80 million was spent on a brand new animation facility as this was their first in-house stab at full blown computer animation.

Despite this considerable effort to break new ground in animation, the story is pedestrian, looking like little more than a cross between Tarzan and The Land Before Time. Furthermore, for all the attention to being realistic, having the dinos talk just looks plain goofy, and disappointing as early trailers suggested there would be no dialogue. And those lemurs have got to go. Computer animation hasn't yet reached the state that it can render mammals convincingly.

Breaking with Disney tradition, the picture garnered a PG-rating instead of the usual G. Another risky change is the May release date. For the past six years, Disney has saved its in house animation events for June, when the kids are off school.

At any rate, dinosaurs usually are dino-mite at attracting audiences. The Discovery Channel's recent special Walking with Dinosaurs garnered record ratings, though with its similar use of CGI, it may have also quelled the public's appetite for this sort of thing. Jurassic Park grossed an enormous $357.1 million, though it had the Westworld and human interaction hooks. Its sequel, The Lost World, still retains the title of all time biggest opening weekend, $72.1 million in May 1997.

Roaring into 3,257 theaters, a wider opening than any Disney release before it, Dinosaur could gross a massive $33 million.

Hoping it has the next warm American Pie on its crotch rather than its face, Dreamworks embarks on a Road Trip this weekend. The picture even features that obnoxious blond guy from Pie and Tom Green insisting that it's a good movie between testicular cancer treatments.

The ad campaign proclaims the road trip to be the "most time honored college tradition." And here I thought it was the good ol' fashioned drunken, frat house gang bang.

Of course, this picture about horny teenage guys appeals primarily to horny teenage guys, who haven't had a cinematic opportunity for release in quite some time. To broaden appeal, Dreamworks has also launched a "See what's really on guys' minds" ad campaign to bring in the girls. Though, the sneak preview last Friday night played to only 60-70% capacity at 800 theaters.

Arriving at 2,530 theaters, Road Trip could boff its way to a boffo opening in the $15 million range.

Dreamworks also opens Woody Allen's latest, Small Time Crooks, co-starring fellow scandal victim Hugh Grant. Though it sounds odd that a studio would release two of its pictures on the same weekend, for the most part the audience for the Wood-man, aside from being minuscule, is not the same one as for a teenage sex comedy. Though Woody himself would probably prefer the latter.

Dreamworks attempted similar counter-programming on this same weekend last year when they mailed The Love Letter to 769 theaters under the shadow of The Phantom Menace. It opened to just $2.7 million on its way to a paltry $8.3 million total. Playing at 863 venues, expect Small Time Crooks to also make small time bucks with an opening in the same $2 million range.

Another Dreamworks offering Gladiator has dominated the market for the past two weeks, grossing about $83 million to date. With momentum on its side and no direct competition until Mission: Impossible 2 next week, it could enjoy another modest decline this weekend, coming in at the $17 million range and likely pushing its cume past the century mark.

It goes without saying that Battlefield Earth will fall off the face of the earth. John Travolta might not even notice since after the disastrous opening weekend he's probably been holed up deep in the recesses of the Scientology Celebrity Center getting "audited" up the wazoo. Expect the $73-million bellyflop to manage just around $5 million this weekend.