For Keeps?

Most of For Keeps is entirely predictable, but that should do little to diminish its interest for audiences of high-school age. Here again, Miss Ringwald is the very model of teen-age verisimilitude, and she's most impressive in making even the most hackneyed situations seem real. Read full review

Director John G. Avildsen and screenwriters Tim Kazurinsky and Denise DeClue do an amiable job balancing humor and pathos while investigating the ultimate nightmare of every sexually active unmarried adolescent. [16 Jan 1988, p.1D]

For Keeps is schizoid entertainment. It begins as a comedy, shifts briefly into social commentary and winds up in soap opera land, with Ringwald acting nobly and self-sacrificing. The movie has been heralded as a sign of Hollywood's new maturity, because the kids face up to their situation. That is applaudable, but For Keeps is old-fashioned and obvious. It is to teen pregnancy what My Three Sons was to family life. [15 Jan 1988, p.C5]

It's all as cliche'd as "A Summer Place," a better movie even if it was soap opera. For Keeps is a soapbox opera, and the slats are about to fall through. Writers Tim Kazurinsky and Denise DeClue are as wishy-washy about their issues as they are their heroes. And they serve up the usual "you can have it all" scenario. After the teen-agers suffer with didies and postpartum depression, it's off to college to prepare for future careers. [16 Jan 1988, p.B5]