Stop! That! Train! is the first film of my criticism career that seems tailor-made for the terminally online. Rarely has a picture been so jam-packed with Gen Z catchphrases, flashy aesthetics, and “self-aware” humour that even pantomimes would suggest dialing down. It endeavours to pay tribute to spoof pictures of old, but the end results are obnoxious and garish. Whatever the price to board, it’s worth more to get off and walk.
The opening titles are a quaint showcasing of model trains, demonstrating a sense of colourful enthusiasm. But then the protagonists start speaking and all promise quickly evaporates. Tess (Ginger Minj) and DeeDee (Jujubee) are ostentatious best friends laid off from their train stewardess jobs. At a loose end, they reminisce on their failed dreams following graduation from train stewardess school. What should be amiable, silly setup is undermined by the actors’ habitual hamminess. Exaggeration is part of the appeal of the drag queen culture this film profits from, but constantly mugging to the camera grates one’s senses. Minj and Jujubee’s performances are in such overt service to said mugging, that their characters seldom feel endearing, sabotaging their chemistry.
In fairness, the production design is dazzling in its attention to detail and welcoming palette. Seemingly the whole spectrum of colour is utilised in the practical sets, the costume designs, and the art direction. It’s in-your-face to a fault, yet it makes for pleasingly cartoonish sets and visual jokes that wouldn’t be misplaced in classic Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker films. The camp factor is dialled to eleven, but, if nothing else, the film has delightfully imaginative mise-en-scene.
Chief among them is the train that Tess and DeeDee sneak aboard. By donning elegant red uniforms, they pretend to be new recruits of the Glamazonian Express. True to its name, the train features exquisite carriages and vain, catty stewardesses, as well as a himbo co-conductor Cal (Brian Jordan Alvarez) that DeeDee falls for. Romance, squabbles, and career climbing are fodder to pad out the main conflict: the train finds itself with broken brakes, hurtling towards a Stormaganza – imagine four cyclones in one. With put-upon Train Command Centre employee Donna (Rachel Bloom) as their eye-in-the-sky, Tess and DeeDee find themselves stepping up to save the train.
Harkening back to comedies like Airplane! is an admirable creative choice. But the self-aware comedic tone that defines drag queen shows undermines spoof films like this one. As ridiculous as The Naked Gun is, the characters never once act like they’re in a comedy. From Frank Drebbin’s perspective, he’s not a punchline, but a serious detective investigating serious crimes. He, and those around him, were never in on the joke, which made the absurdity of the antics, and surrounding setpieces, even funnier.
By contrast, Christina Friel and Connor Wright’s screenplay confines the characters to the genre’s artifice, their campy behaviour never feeling earnest because they know they’re in a comedy. The dialogue spells out jokes and ironies, the performances underscoring them through gluttonous scene-chewing. It’s a film that dictates what you should be laughing at, rather than letting it happen organically.
Tess and DeeDee’s fellow laid-off co-worker Barb (Latrice Royale) goes to work a series of odd jobs, including an office worker and a bartender. This is the first of several unfunny running gags. Others include Sarah Michelle Gellar failing to be recognised, Jesse Tyler Ferguson as an upper class prude, and Missi Pyle as a horny passenger. When not suffocating us with cameos or Gen Z slang, the film’s verbal witticisms include “if mermaids exist, shouldn’t there be mer-butlers?” Similarly tiresome are characters explaining the gravity of plot points, only for them to be asked to repeat the urgency but “make it gay”. At what point does this kind of jesting start compartmentalising rather than championing marginalised groups?
Visually, the film is far stronger than its written words, including in the laughter department. On the railroad from hell, the train has to navigate a tornado carrying Dorothy’s Kansas farmhouse, rapidly changing weather (including an inexplicable stretch underwater), and even a haunted mine shaft. During the latter, the train does a rollercoaster loop-de-loop, complete with ride photography. Both practical props and deliberately obvious CGI gleefully bring these to life, albeit some of the CGI was allegedly created by generative AI, which is both infuriating and disappointing. These are legitimately chucklesome moments that giddily play with the film’s setup. It embraces the daftness without demanding attention to it, as the dialogue repeatedly does. There’s still exhausting reference humour – including a Lea Michelle joke that won’t amuse anyone outside of internet addicts – but this area of comedy is reasonably solid.
Sadly, the film is chronically excessive, its gaudy direction sucking out the fun from the predictable but otherwise affable story. The film’s impressive aesthetics are nonetheless in service of farcical mugging to the audience, the script piling on plot points and punchlines without giving us room to breathe. Even if the train survives the Stormaganza, it’s on a collision course with a nuclear power station located between a hotel for dogs and Laurie Metcalf’s house. One notable subplot that eventually merges with the main story is that of RuPaul Charles (also a producer) playing US President Judy Gagwell. Her character has a tragic backstory, an emotional investment in trains, and eventually comes aboard to help save the day Independence Day-style; creative choices that teeter on the edge of vanity project material. This is a film that fails to recognise that, in comedy and screenwriting, less is often more.
I acknowledge that I’m not the target audience, as drag queen shows like RuPaul are, candidly, not my cup of tea. I can also admire the craftsmanship, which, for better or worse, is firing on all cylinders. But Stop! That! Train! is mostly annoying. It’s obvious everyone enjoyed making it, which is nice to see. But it’s so rambunctious and tawdry that it’ll only satisfy pre-converted audiences while alienating everyone else. It copies the blueprint of Airplane! but lacks appreciation for what made it funny.
Stop! That! Train! arrives in cinemas August 21st
Rating: 
Director: Adam Shankman
Writers: Christina Friel and Connor Wright
Stars: Ginger Minj, Jujubee, RuPaul Charles
Runtime: 90 minutes
Country: USA
