Closing the Ring

Richard Attenborough has assembled a good cast for this nostalgic wartime drama. In a troubles-torn Belfast, the young Wilbur (Dylan Roberts) finds a ring in a burnt out aircraft left over from WWII. His search for the owner leads him to Shirley MacLaine's "Ethel Ann", and our story slowly reveals, via a mix of current and retrospective scenarios, just what happened when and to whom. The beginning is a bit disjointed, the chopping and changing of timeframes and characters happens too soon after the film starts without us having quite enough information to follow the story easily, but once that settles down and the role of Christopher Plummer ("Jack") becomes clearer, this makes for an engaging story of loves lost and bravery. It also doesn't ignore the fact that bombs continued to fall in Belfast for some years after the end of the War too. It's a simple vehicle for the two stars, that isn't the most plausible of stories, but it has a gentle warmth that just about carries it off.