Five Gold Rings

I must confess that over the years my wife and I have watched more Hallmark movies than we can count. Most of them are Christmas movies followed by mystery movies. The storyline of this one is a bit different and overall, pretty good. The cast isn't picked from the same pool of actors as they usually are. That said the male lead actor sounded like Spock - his voice was very monotone, and he had very little facial expression. The Santa had a few too many "Ho Ho Ho's". And of course it wouldn't be a Hallmark movie without the typical, ridiculous "deal breaker" which usually happens about 15 minutes before the ending.

Could have been enjoyable if the man actor showed...ANY emotion. Anything at all. Zero expression on his face. Zero emotion in his voice ever. I started screaming "smile or something" at the screen. Ruined it all for me. And I LOVE Holland Roden. She made it watchable. But he kept it from being fun.

Aside from that it was a neat little idea and the supporting actors were serviceable. All the usual background music and predictable plot of a Hallmark film which is why we even watch these things at all.

I am dying to know if anyone else notices just how bad this actor really is. It's so distracting for me.

6.3 stars.

I think the leads are good actors, however they don't gel. She is standoffish and he's like a lovesick puppy throughout the narrative. But she doesn't seem to notice that he's really in love with her, and we see that he has been his whole life. This lack of empathy and wherewithal on her part exposes flaws that are unbecoming of a lead character.

So as the story goes, she comes home for the holidays and is sent on a treasure hunt by her grandmother, who recently passed away. Her mother owns a retail antique store of sorts. She wants her daughter to take over the store, but she is too career oriented as an aspiring painter to take over the family business.

The male lead is an old friend of hers, seems they dated a while way back in their youth. He is now running his family's private investigator firm.

The two of them are sent on this treasure hunt. He uses his connections and she her knowledge of antiques to find the owners of five gold rings.

It would have been really good, but something was missing. I think the treasure hunt was almost pointless and there are too many coincidences. These two factors cause an imbalance that is difficult to maintain. It sort of fell flat for me. I needed a more quality romance to make up the difference, but it was absent.

The storyline involves yet another quest that has to be solved. An artist, Aubrey Moss, (Holland Roden)comes home for Christmas and her mother tells her that her deceased grandmother's will left Aubrey five gold rings and five mysteries that must be solved before Christmas morning. The grandmother also left instructions for Aubrey to team up with Private Investigator, Finn O'Sullivan (Nolan Gerard Funk). I like that the plot is a little bit different, but like most Hallmark movies still predictable. The movie does sort of drag in the middle, but the stories surrounding each ring are interesting. I like Holland Roden and hope she appears in more Hallmark movies. She brings an upbeat and inquisitive nature to her character. Some reviewers have complained about Noland Funk's Spock like personality, but I find him to be in the Ryan Paevey acting style, more of the unemotional types, which did fit his Private Investigator character. The two leads did have good chemistry together. Overall, its not a ground breaking movie, but it's a pleasant diversion that's watchable.

I really enjoyed this movie. I watched this with my bestie and my bestie loved loved loved the male lead. I have really enjoyed Holland Roden and enjoyed her here also. I really enjoyed both leads and felt they had an easy comfortable believable chemistry. They were two people who had known each other for about 20 years, had thought of each other as potential romantic partners, but had never done anything about it for various reasons. Until now. That kind of chemistry is way different from some sudden meet-cute. The stories of trying to locate the owners of the rings and the resolutions were sweet and touching. This was a real winner for me!