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...
Mel Daluzyan was, at one time, a national treasure to the people of Armenia when in 2006 he became the first female from the country to win a medal in the World Weightlifting championships. Having been born with higher levels of testosterone than an average woman, Mel had a noted advantage over his competitors. He would continue to see further success until the 2012 Olympics when he was unable to set a total. Mel now has a girlfriend Lili and when the threats become too much in a conservative society, he seeks refuge in Netherlands. As time moves by, Lilit feels the pressure of not only leaving her family and friends, but supporting her boyfriend while the cameras follow her everywhere. When they attend couples therapy, she seems to take it more seriously than Mel. The documentary focuses as much on their relationship as a couple as well. In fact it is mostly about that. In the end we see Mel gets top surgery and after few days of recovery finds courage to start strength training again.
Mel is a love story about a man’s love for his sport and his partner, and the film never settles for an easy solution for either. This documentary doesn't go too deep into what it means being trans, how should they life their life or something else. His trainer and his nation refused to accept it. We see far-right marches for “traditional values”.The difficult decision is made to start a new life in the Netherlands. This is an immigration story, and a sporting story, and partly a love story, though the strains of moving away from your homeland eventually take their toll. As Mel becomes more comfortable in their identity in the Netherlands, his relationship takes on the very different different kinds of traditions of modern masculinity; emotional constipation, women’s agency taking second place to men’s control and ambition. It’s a fascinating dichotomy and Mel’s partner Lilli is in many ways just as interesting a figure, in her roles as therapist, caregiver, and number one fan of a former Armenian hero. I don't know what I was expecting but somehow based on what I had read in the summary of this doc, v/s what I saw, it felt quite underwhelming. The good part if we have seen lots of content on trans women but extremely few on trans men.(4.5/10)
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