Skip to footer

Top Picks: 'To Kill a Mockingbird' Blu-ray, Michael Feinstein's musical journey, and more

Lena Dunham's film 'Tiny Furniture' is a lively movie with sharp dialogue, PBS examines a little-known civil rights activist, film critics rank a list of the greatest movies ever, and more top picks.

Atticus at home

As To Kill a Mockingbird hits its 50th birthday this year, Universal Studios Home Entertainment is putting out a Blu-ray version for the first time. The Limited Edition Collector's Series includes fascinating extras such as a copy of the script with Gregory Peck's notes, plus the documentary "Fearful Symmetry," featuring interviews with the cast and crew and a tour of author Harper Lee's hometown.

Film fun and facts

Film critics Gail Kinn and Jim Piazza have revised their list of The Greatest Movies Ever for their new book of the same name, picking 101 films in total with new inclusions like "Slumdog Millionaire." Even better, each selection comes with extras such as "The Great Scene," which pinpoints the best portion of a movie, and "Send in the Clones," a list of films that were spawned by the success of a certain movie. (For example, "Some Like It Hot" led to "Tootsie" and "Victor/Victoria.")

Doing Willie Nelson proud

Pop chanteuse Norah Jones formed the Little Willies in 2003 with four pals who happened to share her love of old-school country. Three years later, the band (named for, yes, Willie Nelson) bowed with a debut of well-rendered covers. They hew to the same formula on their new release For the Good Times, from an appropriately sassy take on Loretta Lynn's "Fist City" to a slinky, playful version of "Foul Owl on the Prowl." It's loose and fun and all but irresistible, especially when Jones puts her own wistful spin on the Dolly Parton classic "Jolene."

A songbook through the ages

Music historian and performer Michael Feinstein takes viewers across America and through musical history in three new episodes of his show Michael Feinstein's American Songbook. In the première, "Time Machines," learn how technology has preserved – and altered – the way we think about the great songs and singers of the past. Season 2 premières Feb. 3 at 9 p.m. on PBS.

Tiny Furniture

Lena Dunham, the writer-director-star of the microbudget Tiny Furniture (out on DVD Feb. 14) has a distinctive comedic take on the world – a kind of haggard spiritedness. She plays a film studies major living with her artist mother and overachiever high school senior sister in her family's Tribeca loft. Dunham has a sharp eye for visual composition and a sharp ear, too.

Forgotten First Lady

Part of PBS's celebration of Black History Month, Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock, from "Independent Lens," tells the story of an unconventional revolutionary who paid dearly for her public support of nine black students who registered to attend the all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Ark., which culminated in a constitutional crisis – pitting a president against a governor and a community against itself. It airs Feb. 2.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Top Picks: 'To Kill a Mockingbird' Blu-ray, Michael Feinstein's musical journey, and more
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Arts/2012/0127/Top-Picks-To-Kill-a-Mockingbird-Blu-ray-Michael-Feinstein-s-musical-journey-and-more
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe