Last night at the Kennedy Center concert hall, Oscar-winning director Martin Scorsese delivered the 2013 National Endowment for the Humanities Jefferson Lecture. He spoke of the importance of preserving film and lamented the studios’ fixation with box office grosses. The end of celluloid saddened him, but he reminded us that there were exciting new developments in film technology we shouldn’t overlook. But mostly Scorsese focused on protecting the old movies—90 percent of silent films are now gone. It’s an important subject, don’t get me wrong, but couldn’t he have talked about Goodfellas or Casino a little bit? I mean, c’mon!

It was quite a curious crowd in attendance. There were congressmen like Henry Waxman and Jim Moran. Kennedy Center-types (very old people) whom I heard asking, “Have you seen many of his pictures?” and making astute observations like, “This guy is one of the Hollywood heavyweights.” And then there were the film hipsters who were here to glimpse their idol—guys and girls who have actually seen Boxcar Bertha and New York, New York. I haven’t, but I’ve seen a majority of the Scorsese oeuvre. Plus I’ve watched Goodfellas at least 100 times. So it was with great disappointment that I sat through the Q&A with the director and critic Kent Jones, who failed to ask that most vital question: When Jimmy told Karen to go down the block and pick up some Dior dresses, was he planning on having her wacked, or was she simply paranoid?