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Netflix s new pole dancing film Strip Down, Rise Up begins with some promise. Finally, a documentary that could chronicle all of the beautiful things that pole can be: sport, artistry, performance, self-expression, eroticism.
But it quickly becomes something that pole is not: a trauma therapy group led by an unqualified layperson with an eerie bone to pick.
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Sheila Kelley, the founder of S Factor, a chain of pole dance studios, is the main character in Strip Down, Rise Up and is often credited with bringing pole to the mainstream, as the documentary shows with clips of Kelley s appearances on every talk show from Oprah to Conan. The film, written and directed by Michèle Ohayon, follows Kelley as she leads a group of hesitant women with no prior pole experience through a six-month program at her Los Angeles-based S Factor studio.