An Evening with Rodney Ascher Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		4.0

An Evening with Rodney Ascher Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Brian Orndorf September 5, 2025

Rodney Ascher is a filmmaker. He’s created several documentaries over the last 13 years, but he’s primarily known as the director of 2012’s “Room 237,” which explored various forms of analysis and conspiracy theories surrounding the making of Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining.” Ascher went deep into the 1980 release, working with interviewees to generate an odyssey into insanity, offering access to the far reaches of the human brain as these “experts” and admirers were offered a chance to share their fixations, trying to solve a cinematic puzzle that’s intentionally missing many pieces. The world of obsession is key to Ascher’s work, also examined in 2015’s “The Nightmare” and 2021’s “A Glitch in the Matrix,” and that grip of compulsion carries into “An Evening with Rodney Ascher.” It’s a mixtape of sorts, presenting various short films, videos, and visual essays, investigating the labor of passion and its all-consuming ways. Ascher doesn’t get too serious with the offering, but for those who enjoyed his previous adventures into fascination, there’s more of the same here, presented in bite-sized helpings of lunacy and artistry.

“An Evening with Rodney Ascher” doesn’t have a plot. It’s more of a short film collection about the ways of obsessiveness, working with various tales of burgeoning insanity that plays directly to Ascher’s moviemaking interests. He returns to “Room 237” land in the opening short, “The S From Hell,” which examines the history of Screen Gems, eventually landing on the studio’s logo redesign in the 1960s, a graphic included on plenty of television shows aimed at a younger audience. Of course, there’s nothing odd about corporate rebranding, but to Ascher, the event provides a reason to plunge into the darkness of the mind. The short breaks down every aspect of the logo, including its brief synth accompaniment, asking interviewees such as “Keri” to detail their haunted relationship with Screen Gems, and some humor is added with the use of “Halloween III” footage to simulate the experience of kids hearing the synth, fearing doom is heading their way.

Unexpectedly, ventriloquism is a major part of “An Evening with Rodney Ascher,” touching on the intimidating elements of the artform. Most of the study is saved for a breakdown of the movie “Magic,” or more specifically, a commercial for the 1978 picture, which offered young, impressionable audiences time with a ventriloquist dummy that stared right into their souls. “The Wooden Boy” segment picks at phobias and the history of the performing art, tracing its origin to grifters trying to raise the dead for grieving families. And there’s time spent with Madame, the most famous dummy of the 1970s, with one interviewee sharing his experience resurrecting the character for a new audience.

“Visions of Terror” offers a more traditional short film form, following a woman’s growing hysteria as she’s haunted by a persistent demon trying to share his horror movie recommendations. And there’s a real “Funny Or Die”-esque plunge into film history in a “Death Wish 3” tale of the Giggler, a violent gang member from the movie, and his determination to acquire a camera to help feed his photography interests, messing with the wrong man to do so. A documentary tone for “An Evening with Rodney Ascher” returns in “Doris Wishman Directs a Music Video,” which presents a tale from the band Peach of Immortality, who discovered Wishman working in a sex shop, requesting the directorial services of the aged exploitation filmmaker for a promotional clip. Footage from the experience is provided, along with scenes from the 2011 Martin Scorsese effort, “Hugo,” to help embellish the artistic adventure.

“An Evening with Rodney Ascher” takes a detour in ASMR, sharing some highlights from the auditory experience before things take a darker tour (as they usually do). A proper short film is offered in “Haunted Horrifying Sounds from Beyond the Grave,” a 2018 endeavor concerning a perfectionist’s mission to capture the actual sound of death for an assignment to make a Halloween sound effects record. Again, obsession is the primary theme in “An Evening with Rodney Ascher,” as the program keeps returning to hyper-focused individuals and their unusual objects of desire.

“An Evening with Rodney Ascher” really settles into a story of fixation in “Enter the Optigan,” introducing viewers to a man who collects optical organs, which were originally created as a musical toy using discs to provide a full band sound to accompany its keyboard function. We pay a visit to his home, which has many optical organs inside, learning more about the history of the instrument and its purpose to “create order out of chaos.” The segment definitely plays into the overall motion of “An Evening with Rodney Ascher,” but it also stops the feature in full, forcing the audience to remain in a room with a man who’s seemingly devoted his entire life to collecting, taking tremendous pride in destroying rivals and offering authority when it comes to the magic(?) of the optical organ.

An Evening with Rodney Ascher Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The visual presentation (1.78:1 aspect ratio) for "An Evening with Rodney Ascher" is made up of short films and clips from film and video. Consistency isn't pursued, often working with aged materials, but intent is there to generate a journey into visual evidence and surreal imagery. Detail emerges on some of more recently created shorts and videos, with newer productions such as "Haunted Horrifying Sounds from Beyond the Grave" providing decent texture and depth with macabre events. Color stays tied to the quality of the source, but most of the feature remains appreciable, examining crazy lighting designs and moodier looks at horror. Delineation is satisfactory, securing spookier, shadowy experiences. Some mild banding is detected.

An Evening with Rodney Ascher Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The 2.0 DTS-HD MA mix handles the journey of "An Evening with Rodney Ascher" smoothly, working with various films and shorts, some from quite some time ago. Clarity isn't disrupted, and while some clips sound better than others, unintelligibility isn't an issue as the endeavor winds through strangeness. Music selections are defined, most with a clear synth sound, supporting oddity and atmosphere. One segment delves into the world of ASMR, employing panning effects to sell the auditory experience.

An Evening with Rodney Ascher Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Booklet offers a "Conversation with Rodney Ascher and Casper Kelly."

• Bonus Videos include "The S From Hell" (9:10), "Primal Stuff" (10:05), "The Man Is the Moon" (28:02), "To Live and Shave in L.A.: The Plot that Failed" (3:32), "Dog Days" (3:49), "I'm a Transformer Too" (3:21), "The Gun and the Bible" (3:55), "The Eye was Firing From Its Head" (4:03), and "The Making of 'The Eye was Firing From Its Head'" (1:36).

An Evening with Rodney Ascher Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

It's not entirely clear what the point of "An Evening with Rodney Ascher" is. While it lines up with the filmmaker's interests and own fascinations, it's more of a grab bag viewing experience, with some segments clearly more interesting than others, leading to an uneven sit that never develops into something more profound. "An Evening with Rodney Ascher" has its entertainment value, but it seems best suited for Ascher-Heads, who share a similar taste in fixations and conspiracies, sold here with some comedic dusting and perhaps not enough concentration for a movie about concentration.