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...
Norman, a young gay black man lives with his boyfriend Garcon in LA. One day he gets a surprise visit from his father who is having a rough time since his wife ran away to Mexico with his brother. He is distraught and so is his son Norman who doesn't know what to do. He ass Garcon to relocate for a few days, but Garcon indirectly comes out to the father which hits him like anything. He is confused as to what he did wrong in bringing up Norman. He brings home a hooker for Norman which he gets insulted by and leaves home. When Garcon shows up home, him and the father end up bonding on unusual things. H likes Garcon but as long as he is not gay. He even tries to 'straighten' Garcon with the same hooker. Surprisingly a few days later, his wife comes back after a terrible affair when reality sank in. She is equally shocked to learn about her son's sexuality. The ending is a bit rushed where Norman decides that he will join Navy and the parents decide that they will take Garcon with him to work on their store.
This is a full on situational comedy that actually works primarily because of some great witty dialogues and an amazing performance by Redd Foxx as the father. Like most parents from hat time, he doesn't know a thing about what it means to be gay and has all of these stereotypical notions of what gay people are like. Yes, the film is stereotypical in almost every gag that you can think so, but with father's acting of a confused father and the ever sunny and optimistic Garcon hell bent on making sure that the father ends up liking him, the film is a laugh riot. The mother's entry in the latter half make the film even better. These are such great actors. Surprisingly the only bland part of the film was title character Norman, who had the least bit of role in the film. Garcon was funny and the actor was amazing too. The film when watched today feels totally racist, misogynistic and homophobic, and yet a head-scratching piece of woke entertainment from the late-70s, that deals with a black father accepting his son is gay. Dialogues like “It’s not like Norman was marrying a Puerto Rican. It’s more serious than that!” Make you cringe but also make you laugh out loud and trust me there are plenty of them. Having said that, the film does have a few tender moments when the father buys some books and tries to understand homosexuality and most of his interactions with Garcon are noteworthy. As it is there were probably very few films with gay characters as center in 70s, so keeping that in mind and if you can be a little more flexible in your attitude with actually enjoy homophobic and racist jokes (I know its completely inappropriate), you may actually end up enjoying and laughing a lot. I know, I did. The title comes from one of the funniest lines in the movie when the mother gets to Norman's apartments and she runs into a black female prostitute and thinks it's her son in drag ("Norman... Is that you?"). (7/10)
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