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The Magnificent 700: Your Guide to the Essential Films to View or Collect on Your Way to Becoming a True Motion Picture Buff

Michael Bonventre
AuthorHouse (2009)
ISBN 9781449026486
Reviewed by Kam Aures for Rebeccasreads.com (12/09)

It is obvious that a lot of time and effort went into creating “The Magnificent 700: Your Guide to the Essential Films to View or Collect on Your Way to Becoming a True Motion Picture Buff.”  In the Introduction, the author Michael Bonventre states, “It also alarms me that the vast majority of younger people I have met have little or no exposure to the films of years gone by, films of the silent era or foreign language films, or have no exposure to names such as Mervyn LeRoy, Preston Sturges, Gale Sondegaard, Val Lewton, William Wyler, Gail Russell, Toshiro Mifume, Mercedes McCambridge, Yasujiro Ozu, Canada Lee, Tod Browning, Edward Cline, Ernest Lehman, Floyd Crosby, Elmer Bernstein, Nigel Bruce, Edgar G. Ulmer, Giuletta Masina, or Robert Siodmak, or even (heaven forbid!) never seen a work by masters like Orson Welles, Akira Kurosawa, Sergei Eisenstein or Erich von Stroheim.”  He hopes that this work will introduce people “to some of the greats of the business whose names should never, ever be forgotten.” (p. vii)

I happen to be one of those people that he is referring to.  The only name that I recognized on the entire list above is that of Orson Welles and (gasp) I have never seen a work  by him.  However, I chose to read this book to change all of that.  I have always wanted to watch older movies but there are so many out there that I just didn’t know where to start and how to choose which ones would be worth my time. 

In “The Magnificent 700:Your Guide to the Essential Films to View or Collect on Your Way to Becoming a True Motion Picture Buff,” Bonventre has divided 700 movies into the different categories that they fit best in like silents, documentaries, war films, comedies, and more.  The last chapter is devoted to his top ten movies of all time.  Each movie listed has the year, the director, the actors/actresses in it, and a synopsis intermixed with Bonventre’s take on the film. 

I am excited to watch many of the films in the book.  “The Magnificent 700: Your Guide to the Essential Films to View or Collect on Your Way to Becoming a True Motion Picture Buff” is a great resource to use to update your Netflix queue.  I am actually starting at the end of the book and watching some of Bonventre’s Top ten picks first.  I recommend this book to anyone who considers themselves a film buff or to anyone, like myself, who is interested in learning more!  


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