Stop! That! Train!

First rule of film criticism is beware of movies bearing exclamation marks. Let alone those brandishing a triple threat. So I am flabbergasted to report that: You! Must! Watch! This!

Produced by (and starring) RuPaul, this zany disaster-movie spoof is led by Drag Race favourites Ginger Minj and Jujubee. They play Tess and DeeDee, middle-aged stewardesses at budget loco Stank Rail. But when that company hits the skids, the besties blag two trolley dolly jobs aboard the uber-glossy Glamazonian Express, stitching their own uniforms to blend in.

There they lock wigs with resident mean girls Amber (Brooke Lynn Hytes), Ali (Marty Lauter) and complicatedly spelt Ayshleiygh (Symone). But workplace bitchery and a carriageful of bonkers, oversexed passengers soon become the least of their worries when the brakes fail, the Captain (Chris Parnell as a latter-day Leslie Nielsen) is paralysed by a scorpion and the train hurtles towards a life-threatening ‘Stormaganza’.

One of my favourite films growing up was The Big Bus, a 1976, pre-Airplane! disaster spoof my dad had taped off the telly. I suspect screenwriters Christina Friel and Connor Wright loved it too. And if Stop! That! Train! won’t win Miss Originality conceptually – aside from being one of the first major movies fronted by drag queens – it’s still an absolute hoot.

I am flabbergasted to report that: You! Must! Watch! This!

Hairspray director Adam Shankman just about keeps the silliness on the rails as the gags keep coming. Not all land – but they don’t in Airplane! either. Smart one-liners, old-school slapstick, satire, queer in-jokes, surreal Anchorman flights of fancy and improv nonsense: the giddying variety guarantees something will tickle your funny bone. Prepare for ‘Tell it to me straight’ to become your new catchphrase.

There’s heart too in Tess and DeeDee’s Romy and Michele-style BFF bond, plus Brian Jordan Alvarez as their cute crush. Crucially, the joke isn’t that they’re drag queens: these are drag performers getting to play proper comic characters.

The bulging ensemble also finds room for plentiful cameos from Drag Race guest judges like Nicole Richie, Rachel Bloom and Sarah Michelle Gellar who gamely sends up her own fading star power. Plus, of course, RuPaul herself as President Judy Gagwell (campaign slogan – ‘She fun!’), battling PTSD from her days in the US Rail Force.

These days it can feel like we’re all living in a real-life disaster movie. Drag artists have always taken the worst life can hurl at you and made it fabulous and funny. Stop! That! Train! is exactly the pick-me-up we need. RuPaul for President!

In UK and Ireland cinemas Fri Aug 21.