Ex Drummer

Ex Drummer wears its nauseating excess like a badge of honour, as director Mortier practically screams the film onto the screen, populating it with the worst examples of human sewage this side of a Rob Zombie movie.

Based on a book by Herman Brusellmans, the loosest of plots sees reclusive writer Dries (Vanhegen) recruited by three punk wasters to play drums in their band, The Feminists.

Proudly claim themselves handicapped, the singer has a speech impediment, the guitarist is near deaf and the bassist cannot bend his arm, they want Dries for his fame and because he can’t actually play the drums.

Seeing this unholy trinity as a meat for his next book, the writer teases out tensions and resentments, revealing himself to be a violent, homophobic scumbag in the process.

Targeting the bassist’s dysfunctional family, especially the psychotic dad chained up in the bedroom, he unleashes a climactic maelstrom of carnage.

With lashings of (hardcore) sex, drugs and violence, Ex Drummer is bound to invite Trainspotting comparisons. But, this walk on the vile side is a bore, with little to say no matter much it’s cranked up to 11.

Ignore also anyone likening it to the 90s Belgian horror flick Man Bites Dog, another film with brains to match its bile. Instead of a point, Mortier and co proffer male and female rape, equal opportunities brutality and numbingly profane dialogue.

But the director demonstrates a visual flair wasted on the material – the opening credits play out backwards, the misogynistic lead singer literally lives upside down in his apartment, and a creepy threesome with Dries, his wife and her girlfriend is reminiscent of vintage Nic Roeg.

But, like all punk, Ex Drummer quickly outstays its welcome. Shock really is beginning to lose its value.

Rob Daniel