I had not intended on seeing Playing For Keeps since I figured that I could predict the entire story especially the ending based on the sequences shown in the trailer. Turned out that there was nothing competing with it on the opening Friday so it was this or revisit something I had already seen. I decided to forge ahead and see a new film so PFK got a pass. This is the story of King George Dryer (Gerard Butler) who was once a top soccer player and is now on the other side of the game after he has aged and his heyday has passed. I had the impression that this was going to be a baby daddy drama story but it turned out to be a coming of age story when George gets guilted into coaching his son Lewis' (Noah Lomax) soccer team by his ex-wife Stacy (Jessica Biel). There were a lot of women throwing themselves at George in this story, so it would be very easy to be selfish, but circumstances forced George to make some selfless decisions. There was nothing life altering taking place in this film and most of the life lessons were subtle, including the male bashing theme that was pervasive throughout. Carl (Dennis Quaid) was a piece of work, we already know that George had issues, and the original soccer coach wasn't at all interested in what he was supposed to be doing for the kids. The best part of this film was when the kids were on the soccer field it brought back memories of when I was a soccer mom, although my son later confessed how much he hated the game. The soccer moms in this film were all behaving badly from Barb (Judy Greer) who was an emotional train wreck, to the man eating Denise (Catherin Zeta-Jones) to the Real House Wife of Soccer Patti (Uma Thurman). I did see a familiar face and now I know why one of my fav doctors Jason George (Chip) has been missing from my fav Greys Anatomy, he was off making this film. I wanted there to be more to appreciate in this film other than fond memories of children playing on a soccer field, unfortunately there was not much more than that. To the credit of the actors they performed admirably and that was a plus. But my expectations were low going in and they were met, I give it an amber light.
Review of Playing for Keeps
