The Wharf Rat (1995)

Cops and robbers, or rather drug smugglers, stuff set in an unnamed deep-sea port. [Actually the location shooting seems to have been done in several different places, including Toronto].

As so often, there is a nice-guy crook semi-hero, who naturally knows everyone including all the hookers. To help out a long-term ex-convict friend, he gets him a job as a bouncer in a club. Gasp! All the dancers are really men! The friend, Bucko, is played as an amiable but slightly slow off the mark kind of fellow, and has never encountered this phenomenon before.

At first this seemed such a horrible cliché that I nearly turned the television off, but in fact the particular situation was developed more skilfully than I expected, and there were a few laughs later in the film. In the picture, he gets an impromptu dancing lesson from the girls.

Rusty Ryan plays "Drag Queen" in the titles, and Chris Peterson, J.J. Murray, and Danny White play "dancers".

HF May 2003

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