The only point at which he trembles is when confronted by the task of considering the place of his own films within the American pantheon. Deciding that his objectivity is out-the-window once Scorsese—filmmaker enters the picture, he gracefully concludes this journey circa the early seventies.

As anyone who has read any of his writing on cinema (his films or those of others) will know, he may well be the ultimate cinema studies tutor. This personal journey certainly supports such a theory.

Martin Scorsese's masterly account of the world's largest and most powerful film industry balances between subjective enthusiasms and objective analysis. A genuinely personal voyage of discovery, it doesn't always follow the trails blazed by orthodox film historians. Sorcesese recalls that all kinds of movies had strong influ­ences and effects on him; not only the prestige titles from major directors and studios, but also the unsung B-movies in despised or underval­ued genres. What he responds to, and cele­brates, is film itself: the movies that make the fullest use of the medium's potential.