Mary, Yes, it is daunting at first. What I did was to go to the end of the film, which would be the most recent (i.e., 1898) and work backwards. First of all, the writing is more legible than what you will find in 1790s records. Had I started out at the beginning of the film, and saw that writing from the 1790s, I would have given up before I started. There was no way I could have read it. To learn the handwriting, I would take a name or names that I knew, and study the letters, and after a while you get familiar with the old handwriting. You will also become familiar with the different names. Most of the names I saw over and over in the 1890s, are still with me in the 1790s. It takes time at first, but the more you do it, the easier it becomes. And yes, the headings and what the minister or priest writes can have different spellings than what you find on a web site. The nice thing about it is that it remains pretty constant. The records I am reading are in Slovak, then Hungarian and now Latin. It gives entry #; date: name of baby: name of parents: legitimate or illegitimate; name of godparents: name of minister, you don't even have to look at the top of the page to know what was entered. Sometimes I didn't know if I was in Hungarian or Slovak records unless I bothered to look at the top of the page. In the more recent records they give the profession of the groom and then you have to go to your lists to try and figure out what it was, but aside from that, and cause of death, if it is mentioned, it's pretty straight forward. By the time you get back to the 1790s, you will be able to zip through it like a pro. Have fun (and don't cuss out the minister too much, I've done it enough for everyone) Joyce