For Keeps?

Directed by John G. Avildsen, For Keeps? follows a teen couple (Molly Ringwald’s Darcy and Randall Batinkoff’s Stan) as they’re forced to grow up quickly after Darcy falls pregnant. There’s little doubt, ultimately, that For Keeps? fares best within its briskly-paced and mostly affable first half, as Avildsen, armed with a script by Tim Kazurinsky and Denise DeClue, delivers an engaging effort that benefits from its snapping dialogue and raft of agreeable performances – with Ringwald and Batinkoff’s likeable work as the sympathetic protagonists matched by eclectic periphery players like Kenneth Mars, Miriam Flynn, and Pauly Shore. And while the picture admittedly contains plenty of truthful, relatable discussions and happenings, For Keeps? eventually (and regrettably) progresses into a repetitive midsection that seems to consist entirely of the characters’ tiresome arguments and confrontations – with the somewhat unpleasant atmosphere essentially cancelling out the picture’s relatively satisfying climactic stretch. The end result is a misfire that never quite becomes the compelling, John Hughesesque comedy/drama one might’ve anticipated, which is a shame, certainly, given the proliferation of above-average attributes contained within the production.

** out of ****