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Stop! That! Train!

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...

Boy Friend (Thai)

This pretend gay plot has been done quite a few times and used to be quite popular genre almost 5-10 years back. Of course, things are much different now, so watching this film from 7-8 years back, it was hard to connect with it. Regardless, I am trying to be objective about the whole premise.

The story is simple. Toey has just moved to Bangkok and in a new school and class where he meets Aek and they become good friends which actually happens in a funny way. Aek always asks to stay back at Toey's place, only so that every morning he could walk with the girl he has a crush on. But these constant night outs make their classmates think they are a gay couple. So one day when Aek is practicing proposing to the girl with Toey, someone records it and the video spreads like wildfire in school. Suddenly their popularity increases. So one of their friend recommends them to continue to pretend to Begay couple and make money. The trio actually works and they become popular till one day Toey's family calls him and make their displeasure clear. Toey wants out but Ask doesn't, which leads to their friendship being broken. Ask realizes his mistake and publicly apologizes to his fans and announces how they are just friends. Toey appreciates the gesture and they are back toeing good friends.

The ending is a bit unclear for me. Did they end up still being good friend or did they started to like each other in a different level. It doesn't matter I guess. The fun was watching how some people can go all crazy just to see a BL couple. I am sure the film didn't intend to show how social media can be a bane and boon, but as we can see today, social media plays a very very important part in our lives. It can sometimes make or break you and your confidence. Coming back to the film, Clearly it is focused on young teenage audience. The lead actors did their part alright. They weren't great but not bad either. I think, given that the story was so basic and mundane, pretty much no one had any scope to shine here. A simple made for TV film, it doesn't bore you. Thankfully, with its short length, the film moves at a very fast pace and proceedings never slow down, which is good. But other than that, it really doesn't offer anything new or different. (4.5/10)

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