Skip to footer

Top Picks: 'Merle Haggard 20 Greatest Hits,' the movie 'Son of Saul,' and more

The documentary 'Everything Is Copy' explores the life of Nora Ephron and the principles that guided her writing, the app Flyover Country tells you more about your airplane voyage, and more top picks.

|
HBO
  • By Staff

Celebrating Merle Haggard

If you’re not all that familiar with the late boundary-pushing country singer/songwriter, then the best place to start might be with the Merle Haggard 20 Greatest Hits collection from his longtime label, Capitol Records. Among the remastered country chart-toppers are “Mama Tried,” “Sing Me Back Home,” “Okie from Muskogee,” “Silver Wings,” “Workin’ Man Blues,” and the touching “Today I Started Loving You Again.” They’re moving and memorable songs that transcend genre.

The life of Nora Ephron

If you’re a writer, how much of your life, if any, do you use in your work and how much do you keep to yourself? Writer Nora Ephron’s son Jacob Bernstein explores this question in his documentary Everything Is Copy, which details the life of his mother and how she based some of her work on her own experiences. “Copy” is available for streaming on HBO Now and HBO Go. Like some of Ephron’s romantic comedies, this one is meant for adult viewers.

The landscape below

What’s outside the window of the airplane in which you’re flying? The new app Flyover Country tells you what you’re soaring over and shares details of landmarks and natural sights. It uses off-line maps and other information, so no need to buy in-flight Wi-Fi or break any rules if you download flight data beforehand. Flyover Country is available free of charge for iOS and Android.

Harrowing drama

The Holocaust drama Son of Saul stars Géza Röhrig as a prisoner at Auschwitz-Birkenau who believes he sees his son. No movie on this subject can fail to move us, and this one has its share of powerful sequences. “Saul” is available on DVD and Blu-ray April 26.  

Your lists, their lists

The List App, which was co-created by actor B.J. Novak, sounds like a simple concept: You can make a list. But the format is fun, with users also able to check out what their friends are thinking about. For some, the celebrity users are the biggest draw, with chef Anthony Bourdain, for example, posting a list of some favorite food from around the world and actress Lena Dunham musing about historical figures she’d like to play. The app is available free of charge for iOS.

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: 'Merle Haggard 20 Greatest Hits,' the movie 'Son of Saul,' and more
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Arts/2016/0429/Top-Picks-Merle-Haggard-20-Greatest-Hits-the-movie-Son-of-Saul-and-more
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe