Baseball

“I wrote 63 songs this year. They’re all about Jeter.” Just kidding. The game we love, the players we hate, and more.

Culture and Criticism

From Norman Mailer to Wendy Pepper — everything on film, TV, books, music, and snacks (shut up, raisins), plus the Girls’ Bike Club.

Donors Choose and Contests

Helping public schools, winning prizes, sending a crazy lady in a tomato costume out in public.

Stories, True and Otherwise

Monologues, travelogues, fiction, and fart humor. And hens. Don’t forget the hens.

The Vine

The Tomato Nation advice column addresses your questions on etiquette, grammar, romance, and pet misbehavior. Ask The Readers about books or fashion today!

Brokeback Mountain
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

I expected it to be really overrated, especially Heath Ledger, and I am thrilled to report that it was excellent, and that Ledger is really a treat to watch — just an amazing performance, and …

Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

“Edge of Reazzzzzzz,” maybe.   Dreadful sequel.   It just recycled the showpiece bits from the first one, which weren’t terribly funny to begin with, and made Bridget into a self-absorbed twit where she used …

Brazil
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

I’d put off watching it — it’s one of those movies everyone raves about that you have a feeling you just won’t like — but it’s really good.   I would have swapped in more …

The Boy in the Plastic Bubble
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

If you’ve never seen this gem of ’70s TV-moviemaking, you should really rectify that ASAP.   It is by turns hilarious, creepy, annoying, actively uncomfortable to watch, and maddening — look, just because you’re stuck …

Box of Moonlight
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

That kind of “free spirit helps uptight guy loosen up” business is so tired, or should be, but the lead performances by Turturro and Rockwell are so charming that it seemed new.   Darling movie; …

Bowling for Columbine
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

I liked Roger & Me; I loved TV Nation.   It’s not that I disagree with Moore’s beliefs, or think he “ought to” be more objective if he’s going to call it a documentary, blah …

The Blues Brothers
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

I’d never seen it before, and I liked it well enough, but not to sit and watch; it’s better as a movie that you have on in the background and you can go in and …

Blue
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

Strange picture.   The pacing is odd, but it works — at least until the last ten minutes, when the movie punks out with the wrap-up montage.   Binoche is either a brilliant actress or …

Blood Simple
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

I found it enjoyable to watch the story unfold, but at the same time, I didn’t care about the characters all that much, which may be the point, but I don’t know.     I …

Blazing Saddles
March 5, 2007 · No Comment

…Eh.   I liked it better than High Anxiety, but I have a lot of the same complaints — too slow, lots of sequences that kind of aren’t joking, too much Madeline Kahn for no …