It was a little more than a year ago when Motley Fool CAPS members upgraded DreamWorks Animation (Nasdaq: DWA) to a four-star ranking on improved prospects. Now the company has impressed enough top-performing members of our 165,000-strong Motley Fool CAPS community even further, enough to touch the venerated five-star level. A total of 861 members now give an opinion on the movie maker, so let's see what's behind the increased optimism of late.

In addition to DreamWorks' growing list of hit franchises, CAPS members are becoming increasingly bullish on the long-term potential of the stock because the company's films are ideally positioned to ride the trend of fast-growing formats such as 3-D and IMAX (Nasdaq: IMAX). IMAX sees huge potential in 3-D and believes it's just reaching first base in its life cycle, while DreamWorks' CEO expects the rising 3-D movie premiums to continue their upward trend.

The eager consumer adoption of advanced theater experiences is benefiting other movie studios as well. Sony's (NYSE: SNE) Sony Pictures is releasing more films in IMAX theaters such as its Resident Evil: Afterlife release this year, while Time Warner's (NYSE: TWX) Warner Bros. has an agreement with IMAX to release up to 20 films through 2013. And, of course, Disney (NYSE: DIS) won't be left behind as the entertainment juggernaut plans to shoot more films in 3-D such as its next Pirates sequel.

DreamWorks also expects the cost of making 3-D films to decrease this year and plans to ramp up its 3-D release schedule to three films per year. To leverage the box office success of How to Train Your Dragon this year, DreamWorks set up an exclusive deal with Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) to sell merchandise, a move which could be a financial windfall. Consumers have been spending more money on toys, with toymaker Hasbro (NYSE: HAS) reporting strong first-quarter sales, and Wal-Mart is the U.S. toy sales leader with previous success with exclusive deals with music albums.

Despite a weaker-than-expected opening weekend for Shrek Forever After and a big slide in share price yesterday, the film still was No. 1 at the box office for the weekend, and some investors believe the film will have legs throughout summer.                         

Do you think DreamWorks Animation deserves five-star status? Add your thoughts in the comments box below on this page, or head over to CAPS to rate the company and check out all the information and opinions the community offers, absolutely free.