Ok, let's say you have an Image View Scheme of Picture Type/Album/Sub Album 1/Sub Album 2 (like I do).
You open the view scheme and see your Picture Types. In my case that's Personal and Non Personal.
I'd like to just double click on Personal and then see all the Album thumbnails. Double click on an Album and see all the Sub Album 1s that belong to that album. Then if I wanted to play that entire Sub Album 1, I could just click the Play link that's already there. If wanted to continue down, I could double click on a Sub Album 2 and then get to just the files. At this point, because there's no deeper level I can get to based on the way this View Scheme is set up, double clicking on a file plays it.
The way it is now, if I want to ultimately navigate to the file level, but still have the list narrow down for me as I get there, I have to hover over the Personal thumbnail, click View, click Album, then hover over the Album I want, click View, click Sub Album 1, hover over the Sub Album 1 that I want, click View, click Sub Album 2, hover over the Sub Album 2 I want, click View, click Files, THEN I can double click the file I want. If, in the beginning, I just hover over Personal, click View, and go straight to Files, then I have my entire list of Personal pictures.
You kind of lose the ease of narrowing down your list of pictures the way it is. The panes are still easier to navigate in that sense. Just double clicking on a thumbnail to drill down would make this whole thing much easier and faster to navigate and eliminiate a ton of clicking. I think the View menu has its place. It's nice to be able to jump straight to the Files level if you want, but when you want MC to also narrow down your list of files as you navigate, then it's a real pain.