Playing for KeepsMovies like Playing for Keeps
- Key Features:
- Redemption, Single parent, Sports, Coach, Romantic comedy, Second chance, Father-son relationship, Small town, Charismatic protagonist
- Tone:
- earnest, humorous, dramatic
- Target Audience:
- Rom-com viewers, Sports fans, Parents, Relationship-focused
- Emotional Arc:
- Hope → Fulfillment
Playing for Keeps

A former sports star who's fallen on hard times starts coaching his son's soccer team in an attempt to get his life together.
Playing for Keeps
Young high school couple Darcy Elliot and Stan Bobrucz are one year from graduation, with promising futures ahead of them. But their paths take a drastic turn when Darcy becomes pregnant. Unwilling to go through an abortion or an adoption — despite their parents' pleas — Darcy and Stan decide to sacrifice their college experiences and degrees in order to keep and raise the baby. After a quick marriage, the two realize it won't be as easy as they thought.

Phil Weston has been unathletic his entire life. In college he failed at every sport that he tried out for. It looks like his 10-year old son, Sam, is following in his footsteps. But when Phil's hyper-competitive dad benches Sam, Phil decides to transfer his son to a new team which needs a coach. Phil steps in to be the temporary coach and immediately begins to butt heads with his dad over this new competition in their lives.

Sylvie lives with her two children whom she’s raising on her own. One evening, there’s an accident, and her youngest son is removed from her care. Sylvie must subsequently fight to get her son back and to keep herself afloat.

A comedy centered on a has-been coach who is given a shot at redemption when he's asked to run his local high school's girls basketball team

A supernatural love story that centers on two parents whose life together falls apart after their son dies. The man, now a successful lawyer, and the woman, now married and an author, get a chance at reconciliation ten years later.

Chris, a former tennis pro, takes a job as an instructor and befriends his wealthy young student, Tom. After being introduced to his family, Chris is soon engaged to Tom's sister, Chloe. Despite the professional and financial advantages that this relationship affords him, Chris becomes obsessed with Tom's fiancee, American actress Nola.

A new student at a soccer academy is determined to beat her rival's team in the national tournament.

Tennis player turned coach Tashi has taken her husband, Art, and transformed him into a world-famous Major champion. To jolt him out of his recent losing streak, she signs him up for a "Challenger" event — close to the lowest level of pro tournament — where he finds himself standing across the net from his former best friend and Tashi's former boyfriend.

Soccer is an alien world for Walter Vismara, an unfamiliar terrain he's always avoided. But when his job hangs in the balance, he's thrust into the role of goalkeeper by his soccer-obsessed boss. Forced into a relentless routine of practice sessions and taunts, Walter finds himself trapped in a nightmare. His troubles escalate when he discovers his beloved in the arms of his archenemy, adding a personal dimension to his challenges. Determined to prove his worth, Walter devises a plan: to play the fool outwardly while secretly honing his skills. As he navigates this comedic yet challenging journey on the soccer field, will Walter emerge victorious and finally earn the respect he deserves?

When the wife of sports-writer Joe Warr dies of cancer, he takes on the responsibility of raising their 6-year-old son, and his teenage son from a previous marriage. As Joe rejects the counsel of his mother-in-law and other parents, he develops his own philosophies on parenting.

An acclaimed college hoops coach is demoted to a junior varsity team after a public meltdown.

Sadoun is France’s best soccer player whose extra-curriculum pleasures are damaging his play and new contract negotiations. Dispatched by his scheming agent to his home village, he ends up reconciling with his father, relating to his fatherless niece, who dotes on him, and training his local children’s team, whom he takes to championship glory.

Contemporary Russia. After he flubs a penalty kick, a humiliated national soccer player quits the game. He flees to a small town, where he decides to coach their local team.

Two years after a Super Bowl win when NFL head coach Sean Payton is suspended, he goes back to his hometown and finds himself reconnecting with his 12-year-old son by coaching his Pop Warner football team.

An English teacher and struggling single mother has her life disrupted when the father who abandoned her as a child comes back into her life.

A young priest coaches a team of uncoordinated monks in order to win a soccer tournament and save their monastery from being turned into a hotel.

A female boxing trainer discovers that her champion cage-fighter boyfriend has been cheating on her with her sister and decides to seek revenge by training up his arch-rival to challenge him.

Bachelor football star Joe Kingman seems to have it all. He is wealthy and carefree, and his team is on the way to capturing a championship. Suddenly, he is tackled by some unexpected news: He has a young daughter, the result of a last fling with his ex-wife. Joe must learn to balance his personal and professional lives with the needs of his child.

Billy used to be a great boxer, but he's settled into a hardscrabble life that revolves around drinking, training horses, and the one bright spot in his existence — his young son, T.J. Although Billy has had custody of T.J. since his wife, Annie, left the family years ago, her return prompts a new struggle for the former fighter. Determined to hold on to his son, Billy gets back into the ring to try and recapture his past success.

A baseball legend almost finished with his distinguished career at the age of forty has one last chance to prove who he is, what he is capable of, and win the heart of the woman he has loved for the past four years.

New York sportswriter Mack has spent years devising successful hook-up "plays" with her friends, but when she unexpectedly falls for one of her targets, she must learn what it takes to go from simply scoring to playing for keeps.

A basketball player's father must try to convince him to go to a college so he can get a shorter prison sentence.

After losing his job and wife, and spending time in an institution, a former teacher winds up living with his parents. He wants to rebuild his life and reconcile with his wife, but his father would be happy if he shared his obsession with the Philadelphia Eagles. Things get complicated when he meets Tiffany Maxwell who offers to help him reconnect with his wife if he will do something very important for her in exchange.

Jerry Maguire used to be a typical sports agent: willing to do just about anything he could to get the biggest possible contracts for his clients, plus a nice commission for himself. Then, one day, he suddenly has second thoughts about what he's really doing. When he voices these doubts, he ends up losing his job and all of his clients, save Rod Tidwell, an egomaniacal football player.

Sybille, a divorced mother, can't stand watching her teenage son Samuel slip into a violent and meaningless life. She is also struggling with her own demons, past and present. As a last resort, she takes Samuel on a long journey across Kyrgyzstan.

Corporate overachiever and all-around fly chick Shanté Smith thinks she's got the goods to keep her slickster boyfriend Keith, from straying—until he discovers a greener pasture, Shanté's archrival, Conny. Scorned, she plans to get her man back by any means necessary.

A successful lawyer returns to his hometown for his mother's funeral only to discover that his estranged father, the town's judge, is suspected of murder.

These old friends now have to train the next football generation with the help of their own offsprings...

A former college athlete joins forces with a sports consultant to handicap football games for high-rolling gamblers.

Britain’s Peter Colt has never quite lived up to his dreams of tennis stardom. Once ranked as high as number 11 in the world, the journeyman veteran has watched his number slip to 119 as his confidence on the court slowly ebbs away. Now, on the eve of his leaving the world of professional tennis, he’s granted a wild card, allowing him to play his final Wimbledon tournament…make that his final tournament ever.

Like millions of kids around the world, Santiago harbors the dream of being a professional footballer... However, living in the Barrios section of Los Angeles, he thinks it is only that—a dream. Until one day an extraordinary turn of events has him trying out for Premiership club Newcastle United.

To climb the corporate ladder to success, a businessman agrees to coach his company's all-girl soccer team with the help of his secret weapon: his fiancee's son.

Anthony Keller, star of his NYC high school basketball team, is riding his way to Cornell on a sports scholarship. But he can only maintain his popular jock facade for so long, as his troubled father Lee has a gambling addiction that threatens to derail his dreams both on and off the court.

Best friends since they were kids, Rabbi Jacob Schram and Father Brian Finn are dynamic and popular young men living and working on New York's Upper West Side. When Anna Reilly, once their childhood friend and now grown into a beautiful corporate executive, suddenly returns to the city, she reenters Jake and Brian's lives and hearts with a vengeance. Sparks fly and an unusual and complicated love triangle ensues.

After 12 years in prison, former high school football star Eddie Palmer returns home to put his life back together—and forms an unlikely bond with Sam, an outcast boy from a troubled home. But Eddie's past threatens to ruin his new life and family.

Two strangers are drawn together under incredible circumstances. What starts as an unforeseen encounter over a long holiday weekend soon becomes a second chance love story.

An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.

Hotshot rugby player Rick Penning was the star player of his Arizona high school team until a fateful brush with the law forces him to ponder the consequences of his actions in a Salt Lake City juvenile detention center.

Suffering from empty nest syndrome, two lonely parents concoct a scheme to get their kids interested in them again: they pretend they've won the lottery.

A pair of aging boxing rivals are coaxed out of retirement to fight one final bout -- 30 years after their last match.

In a vibrant tapestry of love and longing, nine interconnected souls navigate romance and heartbreak in L.A., where passions collide and truths unfold, revealing that the heart's desires often lead us where we least expect.

Steve Landry, an aging boxer with more losses than wins, accepts to become a sparring partner for an emerging champion in a last-ditch attempt to stay relevant.

Franck, a former young hopeful at the Nantes soccer club, has stayed on to help the team for ten years after an injury,but becomes especially frustrated when he meets a seductive young woman.

A former basketball all-star, who has lost his wife and family foundation in a struggle with addiction, attempts to regain his soul and salvation by becoming the coach of a disparate ethnically mixed high school basketball team at his alma mater.

Two mismatched personal trainers' lives are upended by the actions of a new, wealthy client.

One football match on a dirt pitch near Rome becomes a day of reckoning as a young player, his coach and their team's owner wrestle internal demons.

Two young gay soccer players get caught up between the politics of the game and the politics of love.

Following the breakdown of his marriage, a self-involved man begins to embrace fatherhood.

Hardened by years in foster care, a teenage girl from Brooklyn’s Brownsville neighborhood decides that wrestling boys is the only way back to her estranged father.

Divorced couple Georgia and David find themselves on a shared mission: they team up and travel to Bali to stop their daughter Lily from making the same mistake they once made 25 years ago.

A business mogul runs into his old small town girlfriend while she is visiting the big city only to find out that they had a child together that he was unaware of.

Released from prison with terminal cancer, Max tries to reconnect with his estranged daughter and the grandson he’s never known. When his daughter’s abusive, drug-addicted ex-husband reappears, Max’s violent past comes back to haunt them all.

A do-gooder don wants his footballer son to uplift the life of his people by becoming a champion, but fate draws the youngster into a life of violence. Will he be able to fulfill his father’s dream when an opportunity comes his way seven years later?

Emily James, now 27 years old and considered a relic in the world of figure skating, gets an improbably shot to reclaim skating glory when a young coach sees greatness in her. Together, they find their love of skating goes beyond the ice.

Twin sisters Emma and Sam come up with a scheme to switch places so each can play in the soccer team they prefer.

As Maddy takes on coaching a team of young twelve-year-old gymnasts, she faces up to intense city versus country rivalry, racism, cyberbullying and her own self-doubt but eventually takes the challenge head on.

What does a thrill-seeker tween girl do when her mom forbids her to enter a BMX race? Cast an actor with nothing to lose to play her approving dad.

Filmmaker Nicky offers to track down the son that Mamie gave up for adoption nearly two decades before. Meanwhile, Mamie's stepbrother (and the father of her child), Charley, along with his boyfriend, Gil, try to find out what became of the sperm Gil donated to a lesbian couple. Finally, singer Jude becomes entangled in a love triangle with androgynous drummer Otis and his conservative father.

Twelve-year old Theo plays for a local soccer club and has enough talent to eventually go pro. But his father has been on a self-destructive spiral ever since he started drinking and got divorced, and Theo feels powerless and anxious as he watches his dad slowly destroying his own life. But he refuses to give up on him. When a recruiter for a prestigious British club takes notice of him, Theo sees an opportunity to rekindle his father’s hope, but despite all his efforts he is not selected. So he decides to lie and say he was, hoping to make his father happy and proud. Theo’s dad is so overjoyed that he puts all his heart into helping his son prepare for “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” gradually regaining his taste for life and motivation for the future. Until the lie reaches unforeseen proportions and completely spins out of control. Thankfully, Theo’s little lie has already operated big change and generated so much hope, that life is able to get back on track. Only better!

A high school coach, whose teenage daughter was murdered, takes matters into his own hands by going after the men who kidnap his students for their sex trafficking operation.

After she ends up in prison and loses custody of her son, a woman struggles to assimilate outside her former life and remain clean long enough to regain custody of her son.

The story of how Richard Williams served as a coach to his daughters Venus and Serena, who will soon become two of the most legendary tennis players in history.

Henry struggles to bond with his estranged son, Gabriel, who suffers from a brain tumor that prevents him from forming new memories. With Gabriel unable to shed the beliefs and interests that caused their physical and emotional distance, Henry must learn to embrace his son's choices and try to connect with him through music.

Tempted away from Newcastle United to join Real Madrid, rising star Santiago Munez finds this latest change of fortune the greatest challenge yet - personally as well as professionally. He is reunited with Gavin Harris, though they must compete to be on the team, and estranged from fiancee Roz, whose nursing career keeps her back home.

After spending 12 years in prison for keeping his mouth shut, notorious safe-cracker Dom Hemingway is back on the streets of London looking to collect what he's owed.

Beautiful aspiring rock star Jude is stuck in a rut - relegated to recording commercial jingles and lost in a series of one night stands. When she is evicted from her Brooklyn apartment, she is forced to move into the Hamptons home of her wealthy - and selfish - father Paul Lombard, an over-the-hill, Sinatra-esque crooner angling for a musical comeback.

Dutch coach Thomas Rongen attempts the nearly impossible task of turning the American Samoa soccer team from perennial losers into winners.

After a disastrous first date for caterer Holly and network sports director Messer, all they have in common is a dislike for each other and their love for their goddaughter Sophie. But when they suddenly become all Sophie has in this world, Holly and Messer must set their differences aside. Juggling careers and social calendars, they'll have to find common ground while living under the same roof.

Disgraced ex-England football captain, Danny 'Mean Machine' Meehan, is thrown in jail for assaulting two police officers. He keeps his head down and has the opportunity to forget everything and change the lives of the prisoners. When these prisoners have the chance to put one over the evil guards during a prison football match, Danny takes the lead.

Freed after a lengthy term in a juvenile detention center, convicted child killer Jack Burridge finds work as a deliveryman and begins dating co-worker Michelle. While out on the road one day, Jack notices a distressed child, and, after reuniting the girl with her family, becomes a local celebrity. But when a local newspaper unearths his past, Jack must cope with the anger of citizens who fear for the safety of their children.

A busy executive learns during a meeting that his mother may be dying and rushes home to her side. He ends up being his father's caretaker and becomes closer to him than ever before. Estranged from his own son, the executive comes to realize what has been missing in his own life.

Con man Ray is going after one last heist – a stash of rare coins – when his estranged son Timmy unexpectedly shows up. Ray is too preoccupied with his robbery to spend time with his son, so Timmy blackmails him into acting like a father, hiding the coins and promises to return them only after Ray takes him to amusement parks and baseball games.

When down-on-his-luck part-time high school wrestling coach Mike agrees to become legal guardian to an elderly man, his ward's troubled grandson turns out to be a star grappler, sparking dreams of a big win -- until the boy's mother retrieves him.

After reckless young lawyer Gordon Bombay gets arrested for drunk driving, he must coach a kids hockey team for his community service. Gordon has experience on the ice, but isn't eager to return to hockey, a point hit home by his tense dealings with his own former coach, Jack Reilly. The reluctant Gordon eventually grows to appreciate his team, which includes promising young Charlie Conway, and leads them to take on Reilly's tough players.

Monty is a mechanic struggling to make ends meet as he raises his three young daughters. When the court awards custody of his daughters to his shady ex-wife, Monty desperately tries to win them back with the help of Julia, a beautiful, Ivy League-educated attorney. Monty and Julia couldn't be less alike, but a flame is ignited... touching off a firestorm of love and conflict.

When their daughter decides to get a divorce, Coline and Andre can’t come to terms with it as they are very fond of their son-in-law. The only way to keep seeing him is in secret. But for how long can they lead a double life?

After its football team is disqualified for insulting a referee during a major game, a small country town risks losing its funding along with its field. To avoid this disaster, there is only one solution: creating a new team made up exclusively of women to defend the city’s colors! But in a community where football has always been an activity reserved for men, these women’s new status will be sure to shake up the daily lives of the town’s residents…

While visiting his hometown during Christmas, a man comes face-to-face with his old high school crush whom he was best friends with – a woman whose rejection of him turned him into a ferocious womanizer.

Flora and Victor are fun, modern, caring parents. That is, until they decide to get a divorce, and the perfect job opportunity turns up for them. They now have one problem: custody.

After his career fails to take off, a gifted cricketer in his mid-thirties decides that he’s not ready to give up quite yet.

All seems well for Amadeo, a shy but talented foosball player who's in love with the free-spirited Laura. Trouble strikes when Grosso, the world's best soccer player, returns home with plans to destroy the village and turn it into a new sports stadium. When Grosso kidnaps Laura, Amadeo receives the ultimate surprise when the figurines from his foosball table spring to life to help him save his beloved and reclaim the town.

Young elite swimmer Claire is sent to Australia to coach a boys swimming team, where she must overcome an old rival and a secret fear to save the swimming camp from closing.

An unexpected promotion at a cutthroat hedge fund pushes a young couple's relationship to the brink, threatening to unravel not only their recent engagement but their lives.

Is there room for principle in Los Angeles? Mike Terry teaches jujitsu and barely makes ends meet. His Brazilian wife, whose family promotes fights, wants to see Mike in the ring making money, but to him competition is degrading. A woman sideswipes Mike's car and then, after an odd sequence of events, shoots out the studio's window. Later that evening, Mike rescues an action movie star in a fistfight at a bar. In return, the actor befriends Mike, gives him a gift, offers him work on his newest film, and introduces Mike's wife to his own - the women initiate business dealings. Then, things go sour all at once, Mike's debts mount, and going into the ring may be his only option.

Happy Gilmore isn't done with golf — not by a long shot. Since his retirement after his first Tour Championship win, Gilmore returns to finance his daughter's ballet classes.

A pastor preoccupied with writing the perfect sermon fails to realize that his wife is having an affair and his children are up to no good.

Although he always wanted to become a professional soccer player, El Chanfle has settled for being the props boy and water boy for Mexican soccer's Club América, whose coach they both have trouble getting along with because of the Chanfle's heightened sense of honesty and cleanliness on the court, something the rigid coach does not share. When he is asked to cheat during a game he refuses and is fired from his job, but his friend, the team doctor will try to get him back. At the same time, his wife Tere announces to be pregnant, and trying to sell a gun in order to make money for their future, unintentionally scares a old man, Chato, with it, who now seeks revenge.

A comedic romp that celebrates the power of friendship to turn your life around, Dias de Futbol introduces us to Antonio, an ex-convict and amateur shrink who convinces his pals that the best way to overcome their midlife crises and lack of success with women is to reassemble their old soccer team and win something in life, even if only a local championship. Directed by David Serrano. Starring Alberto San Juan, Natalia Verbeke (Dot the I, Son of the Bride), Pere Ponce, and Fernando Tejero.

Under the leadership of their counselor, teenagers at a juvenile detention center gain self-esteem by playing football together. Based on a true story.

A deadly female assassin comes out of hiding to protect the daughter that she gave up years before, while on the run from dangerous men.

Brennan is Liverpool's number one fan, able to recite facts ad infinitum about the club and at a public school in the south of England since his father Gareth is emotionally unable to care for him following the death of Will's mother. Gareth appears one day out of the blue with tickets for Liverpool's trip to the 2005 Champions League Final in Istanbul.

Roland Sallinger is an LA cop who after nearly being killed by his greedy partner, and eventually being forced to retire for medical reasons, flees to San Antonio, Texas, after being asked to work as a bodyguard for the daughter of a wealthy businessman. The businessman had been a colleague of Sallinger years before, when they were both cops. When mobsters kidnap the businessman's daughter, he hunts them down to rescue her and protect her

During the 1950 World Cup, the hastily assembled U.S. soccer team enters as heavy underdogs when matched up against the highest-ranked team in competition — England.

A steely special ops agent finds his morality put to the test when he infiltrates a crime syndicate and unexpectedly bonds with the boss' young son.

A career driven professional from Manhattan is wooed by a young painter, who also happens to be the son of her psychoanalyst.

Unable to cope with his military father's sudden death in combat, quick-tempered teen, Conor, starts getting into serious trouble. During an intense lacrosse camp, his father's old friend challenges Conor to get his life on track and become a man.



