Traditionally, a half-term movie round-up is a light-hearted affair focusing on the undemanding kidpix that can give parents a couple of hours relaxation during an otherwise hectic week. But, such is the nature of the films on offer this October that it's difficult not to wonder just where cinema is going and what it intends to do when it gets there, writes David Parkinson.

A caption appears at the beginning of Disney's latest feature Dinosaur. It proclaims that not a single frame of celluloid was used in its making and that every image was created by a computer. This is nothing unusual these days. After all, two of the studio's biggest hits of the 1990s, Toy Story and its exceptional sequel, were wholly digitised. But does it signify an irreversible step towards a new kind of film-making? Computers have enabled non-musicians to corner the pop market. Is cinema to be similarly held hostage by a generation of techno-moguls? It's a depressing thought for those who still view cinema as something other than a big-screen extension of a computer game or a theme-park ride. But at least Dinosaur attempts to tell a story. Cyberworld, an even more technically ambitious 3-D featurette screening at the BFI IMAX in London, is nothing more than a glorified trailer for forthcoming technical attractions. But more of that anon.

Mercifully free of the trite ditties that have blighted so many recent Disney outings, Dinosaur is aimed squarely at younger viewers. It's more The Land Before Time than Jurassic Park, although the dinosaur graphics are every bit as impressive as those in the BBC's Walking With Dinosaurs series.

The action starts with a wonderfully contrived sequence, in which an iguanodon egg bounces out of its nest and lands, after a series of misadventures, amid a tribe of lemurs. However, a meteorite destroys their island idyll and Aladar and his furry friends have to tag along with a motley collection of survivors migrating across a rocky wilderness.

Battles with vicious predators, showdowns with swaggering superiors and quaint romantic trysts follow with Disnified inevitability. But the attempt to reconcile sentiment and Darwinism is totally unexpected. Here we have tangible proof of the survival of the fittest, yet the screenplay unashamedly advocates age concern. It's a laudable aim to give escapism a moral basis. But its very naivety undermines its value. While Dinosaur strives to educate as well as entertain, the emphasis is firmly on the latter in Cyberworld. As with Encounter in the Third Dimension, this is a showcase for the IMAX 3-D technology that genuinely places the viewer in the very heart of the action. There may not be any stomach-churning rollercoaster rides, but there are some stunning visuals and a chance to see the Simpsons as you've never seen them before.

IMAX may be the future of cinema. But, ironically, it also provides an insight into what the very first moviegoers experienced over 100 years ago. Such is the emphasis on visceral sensation that IMAX impresses with its sheer scale and scope. Consequently, scenes of life on the Serengeti or at the bottom of the ocean are as astonishing to IMAX patrons as flickering shots of moving trains and distant landmarks were to the novelty seekers of the 1890s. But, the problem with IMAX is that the technology is far in advance of human notions of how best to exploit it. Cyberworld is essentially a collection of snippets tagged on to a makeshift linking device featuring a CGI guide's fruitless attempts to prevent a trio of computer bugs from munching their way through her mainframe. Some of the segments, like 'Monkey Brain Sushi' and 'Tonight's Performace' are almost avant-garde in their experimental use of space and form. But, the Pet Shop Boys' 'Liberation' sequence represents little more than a glorified pop video. Fortunately, there are also a couple of readily accessible episodes featuring the central characters from Antz and The Simpsons.

With Woody Allen, Sylvester Stallone and Sharon Stone again contributing their vocal talents, the bar-room sequence from Antz looks amazing with its added depth. The Simpsons segment is also hugely entertaining, as Homer gets trapped in a black hole. However, the need to 'flesh out' the characters in order to achieve three-dimensionality makes this somehow less visually appealing than the traditional flat animation.

There have been many false dawns where giant screen and 3-D technology have been concerned. But IMAX look to be on their way to marrying the two. Certainly, Dinosaur would look superb in this format. But there's still a need for storytellers, and that's where hi-tec cinema is sadly lacking