HOLLYWOOD ON BIN LADEN'S TRAIL.

Byline: Joseph Honig Local View

DEPENDING on whom you believe, mass murderer Osama bin Laden is either holed up in Pakistan, Iran, Chechnya or, of course, an isolated corner of Afghanistan.

Or dead.

Maybe, as assorted sources report, he is sending videos to his mother.

Maybe, as others tell us, he is e-mailing London newspapers.

But wherever bin Laden or his corpse resides, things have certainly changed stateside regarding this architect of terror.

First, in words borrowed from ``Gunsmoke,'' George W. Bush vowed to smoke him out.

Months later the president advises that capturing bin Laden is not a front-burner concern.

The bottom line is that America's intelligence services can't seem to find a towering Saudi Arabian who may or may not require constant medical care.

The problem just may be a lack of imagination.

Remember, it wasn't that long ago that Washington's deep thinkers landed in Hollywood to grill screenwriters about possible terrorist scenarios.

They wanted the men and women who blew up imaginary airplanes, fortresses and cities to fantasize about al-Qaida's next move.

So if Hollywood already helped with bigger-than-life story lines, why not employ dream merchants in the hunt for bin Laden?

At least that is the surmise of my friend Charlie, a television and movie scribe of middling renown.

In a 30-year career, he has solved scores of cases for small-screen detectives. He has sent battalions of cops after gun-crazy serial killers. He has plotted faux murders and bombings in such detail they confounded protagonists for hours. He is also a patriot.

``I hate to say it,'' Charlie reflected over coffee, ``but the CIA just doesn't think like your average hardened criminal.

``Langley headquarters still has too many Yale guys, the same bunch who told us the shah would rule Iran longer than Castro could stay in power.

``If you ask me,'' my pal concluded, ``Osama's left the building, is no longer in the region, has caught a cab for anywhere outside of harm's way.''

So where, I asked, would Charlie place him, assuming his quarry had resources equal to the budget of a major feature?

``This bird could be in one of four places,'' he said flatly. ``You only have to look at the work of top directors to figure it out.

``In a Hitchcock picture, he'd hide in plain sight. Hitch would give him some moderate plastic surgery, then put him behind the desk of Islamabad's Marriott. He'd have intimate knowledge of everyone's comings and goings, the latest dish from reporters and a full switchboard at his command.

``Also, I hear the food's not too bad.

``Marty Scorcese's also a player to be reckoned with,'' Charlie continued. ``He'd have a field day with the bin Laden caper, maybe give him a Michelle Pfeiffer-type companion to throw our spooks off the scent. The guy's an ascetic, right? He couldn't be teamed up with a dish like Michelle.

``Anyway, Marty would send the two of them down to Miami and put 'em in the gun-running business. Florida's crawling with arms dealers. Just ask Oliver North. In two years they'd roll over the profits and be selling Buicks. Marty's a genius when it comes to fish out of water stories.

``And you can't forget Titanic's James Cameron. Look at what he did for the cruise racket. Jimmy would move our boy and his dough to Argentina, set him up as a financier who's arrived to bail out a bankrupt nation. Osama would be loaning dollars left and right and wind up as president. In Cameron's last reel, bin Laden takes over South America's oil fields and donates them to Saddam Hussein. It's box office gold.

``Finally,'' said Charlie, ``there's Robert Altman. Master of black comedy. And - remember ``M*A*S*H''? - king of the military plot twist. Now Altman isn't Altman for nothing. In his picture, Osama fakes his own death - the guy's got body doubles to spare - and flies his entire organization to L.A. Right away he goes into the picture business.

``Pretty soon the CIA is briefing his development people and asking about al-Qaida's whereabouts. And Osama's spinning the spymasters from his suite at the Four Seasons.''

To be honest, I left Charlie more than a little shaken about our government's new-found faith in Hollywood. In the movies, you see, everything must be neatly wrapped up in a couple of hours. In this terrible new world of ours, happy endings are increasingly harder to find.