SNEAKS ’95 : It’s Infectious! : Don your bio-garb: It’s a new year and there are new strains of movies in the air. Are they deadly? Can Dustin Hoffman save the world in ‘Outbreak’? Diagnosis: Sneaks ’95.

Trudging into the multiplexes over Christmas break, mature moviego ers were met with an onslaught of season’s greetings they cared to sit through even less than Times ads--namely, next summer’s teaser trailers.

Wham! Bam! Dolby Surround in your face, ma’am! There were the dreaded Mighty Morphin Power Rangers in all their metallic inhumanity to grown-up man . . . Surge overload! ‘Twas the imminent threat of “Mortal Kombat,” the motion picture . . . Attitude overload! Say hello to “Tank Girl,” a noisy-looking attempt to target a nihilistic toy movie at Generation X. . . . As each one of these previews sucked any remaining good will toward men out of the adults assembled--who’d presumably gone to the movies to get away from the newly unwrapped Nintendo software--there could be heard great groaning throughout the land.

Ho ho ho, who’d wanna go?

So, then, this is the time of year we always find the will to live greatly abetted by reminders that this goo shall pass, and that filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, Carl Franklin, Wayne Wang, Spike Lee, Ismail Merchant and James Ivory, Stephen Frears, Allison Anders, Robert Rodriguez, et al., will be represented throughout the calendar annum, even if their respective logos are not yet tested and ready for market.

Lest elitism rule, there is sass as well as class to anticipate, with action pictures not based on kill-happy video games and thrillers that hold the promise of exciting human interaction as well as internecine warfare.

Among blockbusters, we can always hope against hope that “Waterworld” will at least turn out to be a gill-ty pleasure, not the son of “Son of Flubber” . . . that the popular children’s refrain “Jingle bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg” will have no special relevance to this movie year . . . that “Pocahontas” will put a song, as well as lavishly drawn political correctness, in our hearts.

Assessing the announced films of 1995 (see the full Sneaks lineup, beginning on Page 5), a few trends become apparent, not all of them alarming by any means:

Fewer Sequels: Did Hollywood learn its lesson with “Beverly Hills Cop III” and other recent Roman-numeral fiascos? Knock on wood, but it’s seeming so. We count just over half a dozen sequels and about as many remakes in the cards this year--not many at all, comparatively.

More sure bets, like follow-ups to “Die Hard,” “Ace Ventura” and “Batman” are filling fewer spots for successors. And in the remake bin, it’s generally older, more interesting and less obvious choices--like “Sabrina,” “Village of the Damned” and “Kiss of Death”--getting the clone treatment.

Of course, “Father of the Bride II” tips the scales in both categories, as an actual remake of a sequel (remember “Father’s Little Dividend”?).

Somebody Alert the Fed: Inflation Lives: Life goes on, even in the post-Katzenberg-memo epoch.

Last year’s “True Lies” is looking like the Little Indie That Could compared to the record-busting budget of the futuristic sea saga “Waterworld,” in which Kevin Costner is part Gary Cooper, part guppy. At worst, this $160-million-plus epic will afford director Kevin Reynolds the honor of having helmed the year’s allegedly money-losingest movie twice in a row (following ‘94’s “Rapa Nui”). At best, Universal will add a whole new watery addition to its theme park and be bragging “I told you so” from now till the polar icecaps melt.

Also rumored in the sink-or-swim, over-$50-million range: “Batman Forever,” “Congo,” “Die Hard III,” “Cutthroat Island” and “Braveheart.” Only their hairdressers and insurers know for sure, but at least Norma Desmond might feel comfort that the pictures aren’t all getting smaller.

Even More Books Than TV Reruns as Inspiration: For every “Brady Bunch” or “Sgt. Bilko” this year, there seems to be at least two novel-derived dramas, believe it or not. Foremost among the classics getting cinematic Cliff’s Notes is “The Scarlet Letter,” albeit possibly updated so that Demi Moore gets to tell the whole town off and have a love life at the end.

Besides Hawthorne’s, noted authorial canons being raided for works great and small include those of Walter Mosley, Elmore Leonard, William Gibson, Whitney Otto, Philip K. Dick, Robert Waller, Stephen King, Richard Price, Jim Carroll, Ann M. Martin and, um, Howard Stern.

More Cyberbunk . . . Er, Punk: Bill Gates: Last Action Hero? Maybe not, but with Microsoft actually basing new operating software around a cast of animated characters, it’s all Hollywood can do to play catch-up and return the favor, by setting more of the cinematic action in some sort of cyberspace. (Apparently, “Tron” was 10 years too soon.)

“Johnny Mnemonic” is probably most eagerly anticipated among the Wired magazine subscribership, with Keanu Reeves starring in avant-garde artist/director Robert Longo’s visualization of William Gibson’s seminal cyberpunk thriller. But also look for holograms and PCs as hell’s own portals in pictures like “The Net,” “Hackers” and “Virtuosity.”

A Definite Paucity of Movies About Twentysomething Serial Killers: Not to mention reverse sexual harassment, jobless-in-Seattle Gen-X-ers or jaded cynics who find their bliss by teaching a young cadre of students/hockey players/soldiers to win. Sometimes, the glass really is half-full.

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What here floats our boat? Funny you should ask. While predicting the best of ’95 is a fool’s game when some of the promised pictures haven’t even commenced production yet, it’s not too soon for us curious to begin preparing a mental checklist of what we expect might be naughty and what will--God willing--be nice.

On the individualistic side, here’s a list of 10 auteurist or arthouse-oriented pictures that neither rain nor earthquakes nor bad buzz, even, would stop us from going out to see:

* “Casino” returns Martin Scorsese (last witnessed exploring 19th-Century manners) to the landscape of 20th-Century venality, where his honor-among-thieves moralism has always thrived. It’s another mob movie, but a Las Vegas mob movie, set in the ‘70s, with Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci battling for Sharon Stone’s affection as well as the very soul of Glitter Gulch. Five months in the making and still counting, it’s an epic you’d be a sucker to bet against.

* “Clockers” has Spike Lee for the first time adapting a novel (by Richard Price), and one focusing neither on race relations nor the black experience per se. Will the material be made to rise to his politically incendiary level? With Harvey Keitel headlining the crime drama, it seems safe to predict that, given the mercurial talent, at least time won’t be standing still.

* “Devil in a Blue Dress” marries the sensibilities of three highly acclaimed African American artists--actor Denzel Washington, mystery novelist Walter Mosley and director Carl Franklin (following up “One False Move”)--for a South-Central gumshoe saga. At long last, noir is indeed black.

* “Four Rooms” checks in as an anthology film helmed individually and collectively by a who’s-who short-list of Young Turks: Allison Anders, Alexandre Rockwell, Robert Rodriguez and this guy you may have heard of named Quentin Tarantino. Your roommates at this mock-Chateau Marmont include Madonna, Bruce Willis, Antonio Banderas and a Hollywood ghost or two.

* “Dead Presidents,” a stylized bank-heist piece set in the ‘70s, affords the Hughes brothers (“Menace II Society”) the chance to be the first among their acclaimed twentysomething African American director peers not to fall victim to the sophomore jinx.

* “The Crossing Guard” promises dramaturgical fireworks between Jack Nicholson and Anjelica Huston, who may not have had to stretch far for them, plus the chance to see whether director Sean Penn can transform the unevenness of his underrated first feature (“Indian Runner”) into something more coherent.

* “How to Make an American Quilt” stars Winona Ryder and a mostly female cast under a female director in a feature based on a breakout book by a female author. Yes, in 1995, this is still notable, and cheer-able. And it worked for “Little Women,” so. . . .

* “Waiting to Exhale” has as its basis a bestseller about a quartet of women--including Angela Bassett and Whitney Houston--though with a fellah, Forest Whitaker, eyeing the action from the directorial wings.

* “Get Shorty” looks likely to continue John Travolta’s hot streak, in another idiosyncratic piece of business combining the movie business and the mob. Is Elmore Leonard about to enjoy the attention recently afforded Jim Thompson, while he’s alive to boot?

* “Johnny Mnemonic” may test the limits of Keanu Reeves’ core fandom, but few among the art set won’t be curious to see how director Robert Longo’s talents translate to conventional (or unconventional?) narrative. It’ll either expand the boundaries of the form or end up on a double-bill with “Tank Girl” in six months at the New Beverly.

Other eccentrics and independents we’re keeping an eye toward: Festival favorites “Once Were Warriors” (a New Zealand domestic-melodrama smash) and “Shallow Grave” (whose first-time director the hep British press has anointed as its own Tarantino). This year’s junkie pic, “The Basketball Diaries” (with Leonard DeCaprio as Jim Carroll). Gus Van Sant rebounding--one prays--with a Buck Henry (!) script, “To Die For.” Robert Rodriguez remaking and/or sequelizing his beloved actioner “El Mariachi.”

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But what of the popcorn movies that are the industry’s bread and hydrogenated-oil butter? There are more than a few would-be blockbusters whose saturated fat we’re unapologetically salivating over, even if they turn out after all’s popped and done to be raw kernel.

* “Pocahontas” represents one of Disney’s biggest risks--not much outright slapstick, no funny animals and, reportedly, a teary ending to send the kids out into the malls with. Time will tell whether Jeffrey Katzenberg is able to take credit for another animated bombshell or (less likely, but possible) distances himself from his erstwhile proteges’ first bomb.

* “Apollo 13” is a space-race suspenser with real-life associations for baby-boomers on up, and golden-egg-laying-goose Tom Hanks to placate young and old alike.

* “Congo”--another Michael Crichton thriller where things go wrong --sounds like “Jurassic Park in the Mist,” and we wouldn’tmist it for the world.

* “The Bridges of Madison County” teams director/star Clint Eastwood with Meryl Streep, quoted as saying that the script is better than the critically despised and popularly bosom-clutched book--really, she swears. Some folks would favor an all-out kitsch classic, but Eastwood could very well gentrify the county.

* “Waterworld” has Dennis Hopper cast as--get this--a nefarious villain, which would seem to bespeak a mind-boggling paucity of imagination at the outset. But if Costner, Reynolds and company manage to pull off a “Road Warrior” on jet skis, we’ll be the first to pull on life jackets and queue up for the apocalypse.

* “Batman Forever” makes the move from Tim Burton’s German-Expressionist neo-noir to a more traditionally superheroic mold. The changing of guards behind the camera and behind the cowl may go nearly unnoticed, though, in light of this being perceived less as a series installment than “the next Jim Carrey picture!” at this date.

* “City Hall” is touted as a political thriller, the likes of which we haven’t seen much of lately, what with Whitewater counting for hard-core intrigue in the post-Nixon era. If anyone can fight it, as it were, it’s Al Pacino, reunited with the engineer of his last comeback, Harold Becker.

* “Die Hard: With a Vengeance”--it’s “Die Hard” on a bus. No, it’s “Die Hard” on the subway. No, it’s “Die Hard” in Central Park. Actually, the mother of all high-concept actioner pitch-meeting cliches zips all around Manhattan in this installment, which adds Samuel L. Jackson for buddy-movie dynamics and Jeremy Irons and singer Sam Phillips (!) for local German-terrorist color. We predict: It blowed up real good.

* “Outbreak,” with Dustin Hoffman doing germ warfare, won the heated Hollywood race to be the first virus thriller to make it into production (well, since “The Andromeda Strain,” anyway). Let’s hope it was a case of survival of the fittest.

* “Casper”--despite a thinness bordering on the immaterial in its source material--stands more than a ghost of a chance of scaring up some amusement, if only because of the best digital envelope-pushing that Amblin can buy providing virtually nonstop state-of-the-art effects.

Among the other likely grossers, look for “Nine Months,” a pregnancy comedy (women do it this time) that’s Hugh Grant’s first American film; “Indian in the Cupboard,” another effects extravaganza for the family; “Goldeneye,” a 007 adventure debuting Brosnan, Pierce Brosnan, and “The Nutty Professor,” a Prosthetics R Us remake with Eddie Murphy in a fat suit.

Not to mention “Braveheart,” Mel Gibson’s massive 13th-Century gamble, and first time on both sides of the camera; “Heat,” a historic matchup between Pacino and De Niro; pirate action in “Cutthroat Island”; Stallone doing the sci-fi vigilante thing as “Judge Dredd,” and Denzel Washington and Gene Hackman reviving the Cold War genre in “Crimson Tide.”

And, of course, the film that any self-respecting Russ Meyer fan is most anticipating: potential trainwreck “Showgirls,” a dramatic rock ‘n’ roll musical about lap dancers--seriously--as scripted by Joe Eszterhas and directed by Paul Verhoeven. The big question here: Is that an NC-17 in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?*