equation of pictures" (3) in effect seems like a struggle between the image and the

narrative, the still and the tale.

 So we find Monroe Stahr, Fitzgerald's consummate movie producer, constantly

wrestling with cinema's linear drive on one hand and the ambiguity of its distracting

images on the other. It is the narrative path that Stahr points to when comparing

filmmaking to railroad construction. Flying over the Hollywood hills, Stahr tells his pilot

that the whole business of filmmaking depends on choosing a particular path and sticking

to it. While your surveyors may offer several alternatives for running a railroad through

the mountains, Stahr suggests, you pursue a single path unwaveringly, even if you are in

doubt and "all these other possible decisions keep echoing in your ear" (140).6 The studio

system follows a similarly steadfast path, and the railroad becomes a fitting metaphor for

Hollywood's single-minded pursuit of narrative continuity. After all, what could be a

better example of linear continuity than the railroad? Consider, for instance, what

Wolfgang Schivelbusch regards as the primary goal of railroad construction in the

nineteenth century: "to achieve optimal performance with the least expenditure of energy,

the rail has to run a level and straight course." So the railroad "lay[s] a level and straight

roadbed through uneven terrain" (24). Once the lines are marked and the tracks are laid,

there is no possibility of divergence. There is only the singular trail of continuity to

follow. Doubt, uncertainty, hesitation would lead off course.

 As Stahr surveys the landscape from the airplane, studio filmmaking appears to

correspond to the railroad path. From his overhead, seemingly objective perspective, the

straight and level railroad parallels Hollywood's linear trail. But Stahr is also aware of

the advantages of pausing along the way. In a meeting with a writer who is having