SNEAKS JR. : CALENDAR’S FALL/CHRISTMAS MOVIE PREVIEW : <i> Ho, Ho, Ho!</i> What’s Hollywood Giving Us for Christmas?

Around this time last year, it looked like the film of the Christmas season was going to be “The Godfather Part III.” The late-fall/Christmas 1990 lineup also included the expected heavyweight box-office contender “Rocky V” and “Awakenings,” which featured the intriguing casting of Robin Williams and Robert De Niro.

If you scanned the lists of upcoming films, you might have stumbled over the oddly titled “Dances With Wolves,” which starred Kevin Costner. But Costner also was directing the movie--and rumors within the movie business about cost overruns and production troubles led to the nickname “Kevin’s Gate,” in “honor” of “Heaven’s Gate,” one of the most expensive flops ever.

Then there was a little film from John Hughes’ company that 20th Century Fox might, or might not, release in November: “Home Alone.” Few in the industry had any expectations for it.

By year’s end, the public had delivered its verdicts. The eagerly anticipated movies did not live up to expectations, while “Dances With Wolves” became a major international success (and won seven Oscars), and “Home Alone” became the third highest-grossing film ever in the U.S.

All of this is why movie executives, not to mention journalists, are reluctant to make predictions. Especially at this time of year, when the most important, Oscar-caliber films tend to be released. But an informal survey of film exhibition executives reveals the following as the most eagerly anticipated of the roughly 110 movies due out by the end of the year:

Beginning early in November, director Martin Scorsese’s sexual/psychological thriller “Cape Fear,” starring Robert De Niro, Jessica Lange and Nick Nolte, is due from Universal Pictures. Then, along about Thanksgiving, Walt Disney Pictures unfurls its all-new animated musical “Beauty and the Beast” and Paramount Pictures unleashes “The Addams Family,” based on Charles Addams’ spooky characters.

In December, in quick succession, come “Hook,” a fantasy from Steven Spielberg starring Dustin Hoffman, Robin Williams and Julia Roberts, and director Barry Levinson’s “Bugsy,” starring Warren Beatty as the Las Vegas underworld entrepreneur Bugsy Siegel, both from TriStar Pictures.

Is it because of his romance with Julia Roberts, or his actual on-screen magic? There’s lots of buzz about Jason Patric’s performance in MGM/Pathe’s “Rush,” co-starring Jennifer Jason Leigh.

Steve Martin is the “Father of the Bride” in Disney/Touchstone Pictures’ remake of Vincente Minnelli’s 1950 film with Spencer Tracy and Elizabeth Taylor.

And December also brings Barbra Streisand’s “Prince of Tides,” co-starring Nick Nolte, from Columbia Pictures; “The Last Boy Scout,” starring Bruce Willis and Damon Wayans, from Warner Bros., and another voyage of the Starship Enterprise, “Star Trek VI,” from Paramount.

Twentieth Century Fox isn’t saying for certain, but “For the Boys,” a musical drama about two USO performers, starring Bette Midler and James Caan, will very likely be a Christmas season release. And some film industry executives note that Oliver Stone’s “JFK,” starring Kevin Costner, would be a probable candidate for the eagerly awaited list, but Warner Bros. has not committed to a release date.

The one movie attracting the most attention at the approach of this final 1991 season is Spielberg’s $50-million production of “Hook.” Not only is it from one of America’s best-known and most successful directors, it also has drawn vast amounts of publicity--as much for the number of celebrities, including royalty, who visited its elaborate Never-Never Land and pirate ship settings, as for its cast.

But will it enchant audiences in the ‘90s, as Spielberg’s “E.T.” did in the ‘80s?

“I have high hopes,” said TriStar Chairman Mike Medavoy, during a walk around the Sony Studios soundstages where the massive “Hook” sets are now mostly quiet--filming having been completed two weeks ago. “But I will not be making predictions about ‘Hook’ and I will not be a party to hyping those hopes,” he added.

TriStar, the newest of the major studios and the sister to venerable Columbia Pictures, both subsidiaries of Sony Entertainment, has a lot riding on the Christmas season. In addition to “Hook” and Levinson’s “Bugsy,” it also has director Roland Joffe’s “City of Joy,” starring Patrick Swayze and Pauline Collins, shot on location in India. Medavoy said the drama, based on the book by Dominique LaPierre, will be released in a limited run in time for Oscar consideration.

All three of the TriStar holiday-season films, plus its upcoming Sept. 27 release of “The Fisher King,” starring Robin Williams and Jeff Bridges, have Oscar gazers talking.

While he declines to comment about his company’s prospects, it has been a very solid year for both Medavoy and TriStar.

Before he came to the studio in the spring of 1990, Medavoy was Orion Pictures’ president of production when that studio gave “Dances With Wolves” and last winter’s hit “The Silence of the Lambs” the green light. And now, TriStar is riding high with its release Carolco Picture’s “Terminator 2”--a film that will approach $180 million in ticket sales by Labor Day.

While TriStar’s 16% share of the summer box-office is the biggest slice among all companies, it’s followed closely by Warner Bros. (with “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves”), Columbia (with “City Slickers” and “Boyz N the Hood”), Paramount, the Disney film divisions and Universal.

But the hits of summer are losing steam. And in this business, you’re only as good as your next hit.

If you’ve already seen “Terminator 2,” “Naked Gun 2 1/2,” or some of the other current hitz N the hood, don’t worry: Hollywood has dozens of new titles for September and October. The trouble is, the people who make their living booking movies for the major theater chains are ambivalent about most of them, said John Krier, of Exhibitor Relations Co., a company that tracks box-office data.

“Does it ever look bleak . . . there goes my bonus,” said Madelyn Fenton, director of marketing and advertising for the large AMC Theaters chain, as she scanned a list of early fall releases. “There’s nothing from summer that will continue strong into the fall. But there are a number of potential sleepers,” she suspects, like “The Fisher King,” “Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare” and “Stepping Out,” with Liza Minnelli.

“This is the time of year when marketing skills really count or the films will get buried in the whole pond of product,” she added.

Agreed Fox Executive Vice President Tom Sherak: “There are a lot of titles that have a potential to work. . . . It’s just too easy to say that the sky is falling.”

He did acknowledge that the pressure is on for the industry. “There’s a real depression under way in our business,” he said, referring to the summer, which hasn’t been kind to Hollywood.

The three months between Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends typically account for about 40% of the entire year’s box-office receipts. This summer only 10 out of the roughly 50 movies that opened during the season can be considered box-office hits. Ticket sales are estimated to finish at $1.8 billion for the summer, lagging behind the previous two summers.

“The business needs a kick-start to make people want to go back to the theater,” Sherak said. “There are a number of films with potential . . . You give me a movie with Michelle Pfeiffer in it, and I’m there.”

Barry London, Paramount vice president of marketing, who just happens to have a film coming up with Michelle Pfeiffer in it--and Al Pacino as well--called “Frankie and Johnny,” says “the exhibitors haven’t seen a number of the fall releases.”

“Fall is a viable period,” London said. “Sure there are fewer people available to go to the movies than summer, but we’ve had success in that period with ‘Fatal Attraction,’ among others.”

“I’m not overly concerned about the fall,” said Disney and Touchstone Pictures President David Hoberman, although he agreed that the summer has been “sluggish.” He bases his confidence on Touchstone’s two September releases: the first-time pairing of Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith in “Paradise,” and “Deceived,” a mystery that stars Goldie Hawn.

Veteran moviegoers know they can often find clues to some of autumn’s moviegoing highlights in the programming of major festivals this time of year: the current Montreal World Film Festival and the upcoming ones in Deauville, France; Toronto; New York; Telluride, Colo., and Venice, Italy.

New Line Cinema’s wistful and comedic “Rambling Rose,” starring Laura Dern, Robert Duvall and Diane Ladd, opened the Montreal festival and is expected at Telluride, while Fox’s “29th Street,” starring Danny Aiello, premieres Sept. 2 on closing night at Montreal.

Deauville will exhibit a number of films set to open this fall, including Gus Van Sant’s “My Own Private Idaho,” about two hustlers played by Keanu Reeves and River Phoenix; “Naked Tango,” starring Esai Morales and French actress Mathilda May; the black ensemble film “Hangin’ With the Homeboys”; director John Sayles’ “City of Hope” and “Shattered,” starring Tom Berenger, Greta Scacchi, Bob Hoskins and Corbin Bernsen.

Among the films screening at Toronto’s Festival of Festivals are “Driving Miss Daisy” director Bruce Beresford’s “Black Robe,” a Canadian-Austrialian production about colonial influences on the natives in the New World, that will be released in the U.S. by the Samuel Goldwyn Co.

At the New York Film Festival later in September, the French-Polish production of “The Double Life of Veronique,” by director Kryzysztof Kieslowski, is the opening night attraction. Miramax Pictures plans to distribute the film in November.

On closing night in New York, writer-director David Mamet’s “Homicide,” which bills Mamet regular Joe Mantegna in a psychological study of a big-city policeman, will debut.

Among other talked about movies scheduled for this season are: “Rhapsody in August,” featuring Richard Gere, the latest from renowned Japanese director Akira Kurosawa, due out in December; Isabelle Huppert in director Claude Chabrol’s “Madame Bovary,” due in December, and “The Mambo Kings,” about two musicians from Cuba, played by Armand Assante and Antonio Banderas, scheduled for December release.

Complete list starts on the next page.