I really wanted to like this movie, which I saw on video recently, several years after its theatrical release. I'm a sucker for a romance, but even I found this overly sentimental. I thought the acting was terrific and the casting was genius - having Christopher Plummer and Shirley McLaine played as youngsters by Gregory Smith (from Everwood) and Misha Barton improved the somewhat uneven movie and made it more watchable than it would have been. I liked the way the mystery played out - I liked that the audience had to piece things together. But once you knew what had happened, it wasn't as satisfying as I had hoped. I also found the IRA violence in the modern story strange and out of place - sort of confusing and unnecessary in a movie that was already fairly complicated. Overall it was a pretty affecting romance and family drama about love and forgiveness and all that good stuff, but not quite as good as it could have been.
Review of Closing the Ring
