Child's play, too.

• Author: Oliver, Charles
• Position: Children's films

In the '90s, Hollywood won't make movies for the whole family but will do more children's films.

1993 WILL BE REMEMBERED as the year that dinosaurs ruled the cinema box office. Steven Spielberg's raptors have generated more than $700 million in global ticket sales, and Jurassic Park seems well on its way to becoming the first movie to gross $1 billion.

Meanwhile, dinosaurs of another type--aging leading men--did their part to give Hollywood what is expected to be its biggest year ever at the box office. Robert Redford proved with Indecent Proposal that he can still excite women, provided he wears a tuxedo throughout the film. Clint Eastwood and Harrison Ford went through their paces in action-adventure films and were rewarded with big hits. Even Sylvester Stallone had a comeback with Cliffhanger, though most people agree that the real reason this film did so well was director Renny Harlin.

But take a second look at those films. We have one tale of glamorous adultery. We also have several R-rated thrillers (we should also include The Firm in this category). And finally, we have Jurassic Park; sure, it was PG-rated, but even Spielberg admitted that it wasn't something that young or very impressionable children should see. Where are the family hits?

After all, 1993 was supposed to be the year of the family film. Hollywood gave us dozens of films carefully designed to appeal to everyone from six to 60. But of these, only two, Free Willy and Rookie of the Year, were even moderate hits. Theaters were littered with failed ramify movies: Sidekicks, Cop and a Half, Into the West... I could go on. Even Arnold Schwarzenegger's much-hyped attempt to be kinder and gentler, The Last Action Hero, flopped.

Contrary to the assertions of critics such as Michael Medved, there doesn't seem to be a huge market for family films waiting to be served by Hollywood. But then, Medved never really understood why Hollywood during the 1970s and '80s kept producing the sexy and violent films that earned his ire. So he may be at a loss to explain why in the '90s Hollywood won't make films for the whole family but will produce more children's films, even though the typical box-office take for these films may not be that impressive.

FIRST OF ALL, A LITTLE HISTORY. THE EXPANsion of television in post-World War II America had a disastrous impact on the cinema. Average weekly movie attendance fell from 90 million in 1948 to about 19 million in 1991.

But the decline wasn't...