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Stop! That! Train!

By Golu
Coming out of the same studio that gave us RuPaul's Drag Race, and stacked with a whole crew of former contestants, Stop! That! Train! plays like RuPaul basically taking a bow for the entire franchise she's built. It's not really a gay film in the traditional sense, but with so many drag stars from Ru's shows popping up alongside a few cameos from well known out gay actors, I figured it earns a spot on this blog anyway. The whole thing is completely over the top, packed with GenZ slang, loud flashy visuals, and humor that's constantly winking at you knowing how ridiculous it is. Going in you'd assume it's meant to be a laugh riot, and a lot of critics online seem to be eating it up, but I just couldn't get into it at all. I've never really been someone who vibes with campy silly stuff like this, so honestly my reaction doesn't surprise me one bit. The setup follows Tess and DeeDee, two low level stewardesses who sneak onto the fancy Glamazonian E...
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Still Waiting In The Wings

By Golu
I have time and again said that musicals are not my thing. Very rarely, and just a handful of these films have been able to hold my attention. This film is a true blue musical with OTT performances that you would expect in this specific genre, with predictable plot. Nevertheless, if I keep the music aside for now, it wasn't really that bad. It is a happy cheerful film otherwise with some real good eye candy, who also thankfully are not all that bad actors. Apparently its a sequel to Waiting in the Wings, which I have not seen yet, but I believe its more of a spin-off than a true blue sequel.

Tony, an aspiring broadway actor works in the Broadway cafe, a restaurant that also does singing and dancing. He works there with his friend Rita, who is his roommates girlfriend. Things are ok till a new employee Bradley joins the cafe and around same time Rota's boyfriend gets a small part in a daily soap. Tony and Bradley keep finding themselves fighting over similar roles and in the process, as you ca imagine Bradley tries to cheat and push Tony under the bus plenty of times. Meanwhile, Rita is also a tad bit jealous of her boyfriend's acting gig and starts feeling like Tony is moving away from here. What follows is a sequence of many events where Bradley tries to outside Tony at every given opportunity and also tries to snatch Tony's very hot stripper boyfriend. As you can expect, the misunderstandings are finally cleared towards the end and the friends come together in support of one another, all with with plenty and singing and dancing going along with it.

Tony's character is nice and happy cheerful guy, so its understanding why he would get on some people's nerves, but he is an upbeat person and you just take him as he is. He does get sad and upset at times but overall is a positive character and the actor playing the part does a pretty good job (minus the very annoying shrill voice). Bradley takes every single thing too far trying to upstage Tony. There are many incidents that happen which slowly also draw the line for friends ho start to drift apart , but eventually they come together. The happy ending always makes things better. In that sense this film is a true blue gay musical. The chemistry and interactions between all actors feels quite natural. There is more than enough eye-candy in multiple locker room and make up shots which also made me happy. I wish the length of the film was a bit short with it almost clocking 2 hours. Overall, it is a little refreshing and heartening to see a  film about Broadway and its hopeful wannabe stars can still be made during this grim time when the real thing is closed. (5.5/10)
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