Charlie Thomason is an artist, photographer, web developer, online marketing expert, film aficionado, writer/blogger, and kayaking enthusiast. Charlie currently resides in the Printer’s Row district of Chicago and was born in Red Bank, New Jersey.
“The Recycled Film” was the original name of this blog when it was first launched in 2007 and recycledfilm.net was the original URL. Over the years though, the blog has undergone a number of name changes (e.g.: Recycled Cinema, CharlieChicago, et al.) and there was even a 2-year period where recycledfilm.net was owned by someone else. This site can now be accessed via recycledfilm.net, recycledcinema.com, charlesthomason.com, charliethomason.com, and cthomason.com.
The name “Recycled Film” is a reference to the concept of “Recycled Cinema” coined by film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum, who wrote in a 1994 issue of the Chicago Reader:
“One of the more deceitful explanations for the compulsive repetition that informs most contemporary movies is that Hollywood is simply giving the public what they want … A more likely explanation for all the recycling is that it serves business interests — and contrary to what you read in Variety and Premiere, that is not necessarily the same thing as serving the public. “They liked it before, so I guess they’ll like it again” is an argument that implies first that people always like what they’ve spent their money on, and second that they want their pleasures endlessly repeated rather than varied.”
This basically sums up why I love independent film so much, which always offers something new and exciting rather than the same old Hollywood rehash. If you want to see the best and most original films the world has to offer, you need to go to places like the Music Box Theatre or even Sundance.
Nowadays, The Recycled Film features content on a much broader array of subjects than just film—everything from Ruby on Rails programming to grunge music history to random iPhone photos. Occasionally, you’ll find a lot of my own, original art work on this blog, as well. Recycled Film is just a catchy name that has stuck and is better than calling it “Charlie’s Blog” or something.
If you’d like to get to know me even better, here are a few of my favorite things:
- Camera of choice: Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 with 20mm f/1.7 “pancake” lens
- Favorite artistic medium: Sumi-E or India ink with a dip pen or ink brush
- Top 3 favorite films: Edward Scissorhands, The Empire Strikes Back, and Taxi Driver
- Favorite actor and actress: Vincent Price and Kate Winslet
- Favorite non-fiction book: “The Devil in the White City” by Erik Larson
- Favorite fiction book: “Perfume: The Story of a Murderer” by Patrick Süskind
- Favorite blog: In Over Your Head by Julien Smith
- Top 3 favorite bands: Tom Waits, Nirvana, and The Beatles
- Favorite place on Earth besides Chicago: Venice, Italy
- Web browser of choice: Firefox
You can also find me on Instagram (username: charliethomason), YouTube, and Vimeo. If the popularity of this blog increases enough, I’ll eventually create a Facebook Page, but for now you can find me on Facebook here.
