. . . . "Spawned from the 1960s counterculture, and given a measure of creative freedom by sclerotic movie studios, filmmakers such as Robert Altman, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Hal Ashby and Michael Cimino churned out fresh, idiosyncratic and personal films (as did their financially more successful brethren, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas)." . .