FACES ‘94: Some Names to Be Reckoned With in the New Year : FILM : Leonardo DiCaprio

1993 was pretty good for Leonardo DiCaprio, who mesmerized audiences with his star turns in “This Boy’s Life” and the limited release of “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.” But this year, his career as the preeminent actor of the post-Brat Pack generation shows real promise of taking off.

“Grape,” which earned him awards from the Los Angeles Film Critics Assn. and National Board of Review as well as a Golden Globe nomination for best supporting actor, opens wide this month. And the rest of the year will see him in the Western “The Quick and the Dead,” opposite Sharon Stone, for Sam Raimi; in a short film on the festival circuit, “The Foot-Shooting Party,” a Vietnam tale in which DiCaprio’s character considers maiming himself to avoid military service; and, it looks likely, in the film version of Jim Carroll’s gritty memoirs, “The Basketball Diaries.”

DiCaprio, only 19 and living in Los Feliz with his mother, thinks, to paraphrase Mick Jagger, that time is on his side. He’s not worried about chasing after adult roles: “I’m young, young-looking and young at heart. It’s best for me to capitalize on that.”

The kudos hasn’t gone to his head--at least completely. “People looking at and appreciating your work--that’s just as much of it as acting.”

* MORE FACES FOR ‘94: Rap: Domino; country: Bobbie Cryner; classical, Michael Kieran Harvey; theater: Cheryl L. West; movie making: Ron Mita, Jim McClain; family: Parachute Express. F4