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The summer movie season doesn't begin in America until this weekend, when the thriller Crimson Tide invades more than 2,000 theaters. But any savvy moviegoer already knows enough to make some confident predictions about Hollywood's hot-weather product.

Biggest Hit: Batman Forever. It's got Jim Carrey as the Riddler (enough said). Plus sex, laughs, swank, acres of heavy leather-and a great logo.

Highest Death Toll: Die Hard with a Vengeance. Evil genius Jeremy Irons wants to kill all of New York City; tough cop Bruce Willis wants to wear a T shirt and get sooty. Subways, trucks, actors' mannerisms-all get blown skyline-high.

Top Mel Gibson Movie: Not the Scottish adventure Braveheart-in that one, Mel talks funny, his hair's too long, and he's literally blue in the face-but Pocahontas, the Disney animated feature for which Gibson supplied the voice of John Smith.

Best Scene Stealer: Armand Assante in Judge Dredd. Sylvester Stallone is the star, but Assante oozes suave comic menace as a villain who seemingly can't be killed. Hey, Mr. Mean, we thought you were dead. "I got betta," he explains.

Most Exotic Accent: A tie, between the obscure one used by Robin Williams as an obstetrician in Nine Months and the Italianate vocalizing of Meryl Streep as the lonely wife romanced by Clint Eastwood in The Bridges of Madison County.

Least Attractively Photographed Beautiful People: Richard Gere and Julia Ormond in First Knight. As Lancelot and Guinevere, these two dishy stars look oddly washed out. Quick! Makeup!

Biggest Surprise: Waterworld, the $200 quillion sump that has sucked in Kevin Costner, Universal Pictures and director Kevin Reynolds -- who recently walked off the production, leaving the final editing to Costner and others. It might actually be an entertaining movie. such, at least, is the accumulated wisdom to be gleaned from watching not the actual summer movies-that would be cheating! -- but the films' trailers. Hollywood will be spending more than $2 billion to make and market 50 or so pictures between now and summer's end, and the moguls want you to want to see what they've got. So they flood theaters and TV stations with previews of coming attractions. Clips from the film are seductively arranged to make salami look like steak, and wrapped in a tag line so memorable it will cut through the competing clutter: "On a bad day, he's the best there is" (the Die Hard film); "The most passionately read love story of our time" (Madison County); and don't forget "Congo -- where you are the endangered species."

Movie exhibitors take trailers seriously; they are used as one gauge to determine how many screens a film will play on. From looking at previews of this summer's biggies, many theater owners are enthusiastic. Wall Street is also excited. The Walt Disney Co.'s stock rose this winter after analysts got a peek, in preview form, at the studio's likely hits Crimson Tide and Pocahontas. The rest of the industry would welcome any good news. It has limped through a virtually hit-free first four months of '95; of the year's releases, only Outbreak and Bad Boys have earned more than $50 million at the domestic box office. With receipts down 5% from last year's lackluster presummer, the town needs some quick hits.