User Reviews

The story was interesting a bit forced at times.

We never truly got a sense of how repressed she was or for how long. Not enough time was given to explore that side, so we didn't really buy into it.

Chelsea is a very good actress, however the final stage scene struck me as very stiff and didn't really portray the inner change the character came to describe in her monologue. I never got the sense that she honestly felt what she was describing, but rather simply described it like reading a passage from a book or script.

The ending is what I hated. A woman who described herself as "taking the confidence" her gogo persona had given her, then when faced with an old boyfriend who dumped her, reverts back to the insecure girl she once was.

It lacked the honesty of what her experiences were supposed to have transformed her into.

I'd have rather have seen her offer him the "opportunity" to win her back. THAT would have been true to a character who had discovered and understood the power of her own sexuality. A person who found and exercised her new found confidence and didn't need her man, but rather wanted him to want her for who she became on equal terms.

This film is in the genre of lifetime movies--therefore it is does not give the darkest view of this profession. However, the person who wrote the review stating that this film does not portray the reality of this profession is not completely knowledgeable about this line of work. Therefore the statement: ''guaranteed the reality is much starker and does not end with someone going back to acting class or entering law school'')--is not well informed. Lifetime movies--derived from real life or dealing with a real issue typically show the character transformed by end--in this one, the main character does re-focus her energy back on her original career goals. Therefore art imitates life. There are MANY go go dancers, strippers, call girls, etc, who certainly have gotten out of the ''adult entertainment profession in question'' and gone on to another chapter in their life. This movie portrays the lure of this profession--flexibility in hours, higher wages, and indulging in men's sexual fantasies. I actually even know the girl--jill morley--who wrote and starred in the one-woman show which inspired this lifetime movie! She is an inspiring person. Movies like these are important--and lifetime has really mastered this genre-telling stories derived from everyday women's lives who overcome obstacles, life changes, and are poster women for today's serious issues.

Any film title starting with the words "Confessions of a..." conjures up memories of that (generally pretty feeble) series of British softcore sex comedies from the 1970s, but "Confessions of a Go-Go Girl", a more recent (2008) American-Canadian film, is not a horse from that particular stable. It is ostensibly set in Chicago but was mostly filmed in Canada, although a few genuine Chicago locations appear for the sake of authenticity.

The main character is Jane McCoy, a girl from a well-heeled upper middle-class family, who decides to become an actress, much to the disgust of her parents who do not consider acting a proper career and would much rather she became a lawyer. They refuse to fund her studies at drama school, leaving her in financial difficulties, so when her friend Angela suggests an "easy way" to make extra money Jane is all too ready to listen.

The job Angela has in mind is, of course, go-go dancing at a local club. This development might suggest that the film will go down one of two routes, becoming either (Route 1) a sex comedy along the lines of the late and unlamented British "Confessions" series ("Jane and Angela get up to all sorts of randy antics with their male customers") or (Route 2) a lurid exposé of the dark side of the adult entertainment industry ("Jane and Angela slide further and further down the slippery slope of moral depravity and come to a bad end").

Well, this film is certainly not a comedy. As far as Angela is concerned it follows Route 2 without deviating from the roadmap. The club where she and Jane start out is quite tame by the standards of the adult industry; the girls dance in their underwear, but nudity and toplessness are forbidden, as is touching the punters or allowing them to touch you. Angela realises that more money can be made by dancing in those clubs which offer raunchier forms of entertainment and, predictably, goes tumbling down the aforesaid slippery slope into drug addiction and prostitution before coming to the inevitable bad end. She dies on the operating table during a breast-enhancement operation following an adverse reaction between the anaesthetic and all those drugs in her system, making the film a very twenty-first century morality tale against the sin of vanity. Or at least the vanity of wanting big breasts.

And Jane? Well Jane may be a go-go dancer but she is still at heart a sweet young thing; indeed, part of her appeal for a certain type of punter is her ability to combine sexiness with cuteness. (It helps that Chelsea Hobbs, the actress who plays her, is more girl-next-door than Hollywood glamour queen). Of course, all does not go well even with Jane. She believes that her work is beneficial to her acting career because it enables her to explore facets of her personality which would otherwise remain hidden, but this sort of logic cuts no ice with her drama teacher, a devotee of High Culture who cannot tolerate her students having any involvement with Low Culture. (And in her eyes go-go dancing is right down at the bargain basement end of the market).

Jane also further alienates her parents when her brother, quite ignorant of his sister's way of earning her pin money, happens to choose her club for his stag do and walks through the door with his friends while she is on stage. To make matters worse, her father is with them. Ignoring Jane's argument that her working in such an establishment is morally no worse than his patronising it, the stern paterfamilias goes into "Never darken my doors again!" mode. Nevertheless, Jane has enough strength of character not to follow Angela down the primrose path to destruction and, for her, all ends happily.

"Confessions of a Go-Go Girl", actually, is not a bad film, certainly not as bad as I feared it might be. It might be full of clichés, especially in its treatment of Angela's story, but Hobbs makes Jane a likeable heroine and there is enough material here to provide an entertaining hour-and-a-half. 6/10

The movie does depict this life. What starts out as a part-time job or an adventure becomes a habit for easy money. Many women do go work more hardcore clubs to earn higher tips and have a hard time leaving the "life". School usually goes by the wayside. Sad thing about the movie is how it is so true how the men of the family are quick to judge their own daughters and inflict cruelty when they, themselves, are the first ones at the clubs. Of course, they have their excuses of how they "only" come to the strip clubs to entertain clients or for bachelor parties. The brother who was there for his own bachelor party was the first to call his own sister a "dog". I can see why the friend was hardened by the work and aimed to steal & get what she could from the men who pay for sexual entertainment. The double standards exists and it comes from our own homes such as with the young lady. Her family was quick to extort money from her when she did not want to attend law school but then scoffed her even though she more than "paid them back". I wish the movie did have an ending where she was more empowered rather than groveling at her family's feet or the acting teacher's door.

***SPOILERS*** Better then you would have expected Lifetime Netowrk movie involving a just graduated from collage Jane McCoy, Chelsea Hobbs, who against her parents wishes forgoes going to law school to pursue her true love in becoming an actress.

With her distraught parents Grace & Jim McCoy,Karen Kruper & James D. Hopkin, who had paid for her law school education in advance cutting her off from the family bank account Jane is forced to pay for her acting classes as well as living expenses by herself in getting a job at a local department store selling cosmetics. It's then that Jane runs into Angela Lucas, Sarah Carter, who offer her to share her loft apartment with her and her boyfriend Kurt, Tygh Runyan, a recovering coke addict and now doing a little picture taking on the side.

This strange arrangement leads Jane to gravitate to Algela's place of employment in the Chicago red light district. The Shakers Go-Go Bar run by the sweet kind and caring for those who work at his establishment Nick Harvey, Corbin Bernsen, where Angela works as a go-go-dancer. Needing the money Jane is forced to get a job at "Nick's Place" and with her girl next door act she soon becomes that main attraction at the Shakers Go-Go-Bar!

Back at acting class Jane uses her experience as a go-go dancer to help her bring out her inner most emotions on stage that greatly impresses her hard nosed and US Marine drill Sergent like teacher Ann Brason,Judith Brchan, to no end. Meanwhile back at the loft things aren't going that good between Angela and her boyfriend Kurt. Getting back to his old habits as a coke-head Kurt ends up snorting away Angels's life savings, $42,000.00, and takes off in the dead of night leaving her now on the brink of being evicted.

Working now twice as hard to pay the rent Jane and Anglea begin to suffer burn-out at the go-go bar which leads the two now desperate girls to consider working at the notorious Tantra Club in downtown Chicago where the pay is twice as much as at "Nick's Place" but where everything goes including their skimpy go-go outfits.

It's Angela who gets the worst of it in besides getting re-hooked on coke, a habit she picked up living with Kurt, her obsession of enlarging her breasts to make her more attractive on stage and thus make more money soon backfires on her. Paying Doctor Double D, Terry David Mulligan, to give her a "boob job" by surgically implanting what looked like a pair of water balloons in her chest Angela suffered a violent allergic reaction to the operation in her being a coke addict! That soon lead Angela to go into cardiac arrest from which she never recovered!

***SPOILERS*** As for the now on her own Jane she was discovered by both her father and boyfriend Eric, Travis Milne, doing her girl next door act on stage at the notorious Tantra Club where the two were attending a friend of theirs bachelor party! With the truth now out about her secret life Jane finally got her act together at the acting school, that she was recently kicked out of, as well as with her shocked parents and brother the head shrinker or psychiatrist of the family little Jamie, Graeme Black.

Despite all the horrors that she went trough as a go-go dancer in the end that experience made Jane a much better and more mature young woman. It showed Jane what the hard life on the outside world, that she was sheltered from by her parents, really is all about! And by her experiencing it gave the Jane the motivation to perfect her acting talent as well as her ability to overcome all the obstacles that it, that hard life, will confront her with in the future!

After seeing this movie, I'm appalled with Jane. I can't believe she was stripping her body for money. Talk about selling herself short. Plus, her brother did have a point when he called her a dog. Personally, she was a follower and followers are like dogs on leashes. If someone told her to roll over and play dead, she'd be stupid enough to do that. Her parents taught her how to be a leader and she turns around and does the opposite. That doesn't make sense at all. This is worse than grade 10 when one of my classmates I was in love with said that one of my classmates I didn't get along with in grade 9 was a follower. The follower boy was Michael Addy. My classmate told me how he always follows Arthur Hudson and looks for him. It's like Michael is his dog or something. I told my classmate to picture Arthur rubbing Michael's belly while Michael is on the ground begging for more. That's seduction and that's all it takes. You know something? If Arthur told him to wear a leash around his neck, he'd be stupid enough to do it. After he gets seduced, he can feel free to wear the leash. Plus, if Arthur told Michael to sit, stay, beg, roll over, and play dead, you'd bet he would do it. Pathetic! All it took was a belly rub and a leash around your neck to guide you in the wrong direction. Jane let this happen to herself too. She had to keep begging for more while Angela kept rubbing her belly. She might as well have worn a leash around her neck and be done with it. Her family knew she was up to something and I knew it was going to catch up with her. Well, she better start making the right decisions in life from now on.

Set in the Windy City, "Confessions of a Go-Go Girl" tells the saga of young Jane McCoy, who opts out of law school to pursue her dream of acting. But when her parents disown her for following her own path, Jane chooses to work in a go-go joint, feels the rush, and becomes caught up in the new persona of her stage name Dylan.

In an intriguing moment in the film, Jane's acting teacher assigns the class a project in which each performer must adopt a completely new persona that will affect the interpretation of their monologues. Of course, this is the exact experience that is happening to Jane in her new identity as Dylan.

Some of choices made by the screenwriters were not credible, especially the inflated tips that Jane and her friend Angela made at a sleazy club. First, the male clients did not appear to be affected by the booze during the routines. The clear impression was that Jane was raking in thousands of dollars that was not apparent at all in their $1 tips. A more realistic portrait of the work was seen in the fate of Angela, who lost everything due to the pressures of trying to sustain herself long-term as a stripper.

The filmmakers wanted to depict a protagonist who was breaking out of her cocoon and undergoing a learning experience while working at go-go. In this regard, the film received a boost from the excellent performer playing Jane/Dylan. The ending monologue she delivered as the culmination of her acting class was thoughtful and moving.

By the end of the film, it is not clear what the future holds for Jane. Will she playing the Goodman and Second City? Or waiting tables? Will her relationship with Eric really work out after he has callously humiliated her, then brings her flowers in an attempt to atone? At least, Jane feels a new confidence about her identity as a person. Which is more than one could say for her feckless parents, who bled her dry for demanding repayment of her deposit for law school.