: About Me

Joe Murray is the nom de plume of Thomas Murray, an ex-math teacher and wannabe screenwriter living for the most part in the Midwest.

I have a BLS in communications (worthless) and BA in physics, and am a habitual federal worker who gains employment at the Census Bureau once every ten years.

In the brief time that I spent living in Los Angeles, I actually sold an option for a TV pilot. But this can be said of everyone who's ever lived in LA.

I'll be 57 years-old this April. Born in Kentucky, educated in the northwest, I have no regional accent, and whenever I beat a computer at chess, I have nothing more to do with it.

I'm writing under the pseudonym Joe Murray because it flows better. And every Joe I've ever met has been a pretty nice guy.

My passion is ...

The movies.

I know too much about ...

The movies.

My parents always told me ...

To tuck my shirt in.

My childhood ambition ...

Become a cowboyastronautfiremanscientistpolitician.

My favorite memory ...

Christmas morning 1959 when I told my sister there is no Santa Claus.

Why I write ...

For the exhilaration. It's like taking my brain out for a walk.

What I am reading/watching/listening to ...

The Great Bridge, LOST, Lily Allen.

My first job ...

Usher at the Fox-Kettering Movie Theatre.

My best moment ...

When I stood up for the 1st Amendment when my university censured me for an April Fools' edition of the student newspaper.

My inspiration ...

My nephew.

Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: James Cameron's Avatar

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There are three kinds of people who attend movie matinees around UCLA: Pods of mothers pre-screening new films for their kids, single dads pre-screening the movies for their kids, and stoned college students.  So bear this in mind if you contemplate taking your toddler to see "Avatar." What a teen or adult would find cool, visionary or spectacular, a tender mind not desensitized by the intimate perils or hellish imagery of a "Deliverance" or "Alien" could keep their parents up with nightmares till puberty, 'cuz "Avatar's” protagonist quickly finds that the jungles of Pandora are...

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