Stream It Or Skip It: 'Five Gold Rings' on Hallmark Mystery, in which an artist and a private investigator make a perfect pair (2025)

Five Gold Rings is a new Hallmark Mystery holiday romance starring Teen Wolf‘s Holland Roden and Glee‘s Nolan Gerard Funk. It’s a tale as old time: big city girl and smalltown guy, childhood friends reconnecting over Christmastime. Throw in a (blessedly quick) tree decorating montage and you’d think you have a Hallmark story like any other, but this one still manages to feel a little different. Is it enough to be worth a watch? Keep reading to find out!

FIVE GOLD RINGS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Audrey Miller (Holland Roden) is a painter living in New York City, where she lately has struggled to find any inspiration. Four months after the death of her beloved grandmother, Molly (Susanna Portnoy), Audrey returns to her small Minnesota hometown of Sprindside for the holiday season. There, she grew up showered in love by her single mother, Kay (Henriette Ivanans), and Molly, who co-owned and ran an antique shop consistently voted the town’s best. After Molly names Kay and Audrey the new shop owners in her will, the two Miller women make tentative plans to sell the business, as Audrey wants to remain in New York City and Kay can’t keep things up on her own.

Conflicted about returning to her beloved hometown in a time of mourning and lacking artistic inspiration, Audrey soon finds a new spark thanks to another part of her grandmother’s will. Molly had a beautiful old wooden writing desk, in which she’d have a young Audrey store missing trinkets and items found at the local beach in a “secret spot.” The first found item to be stored in said compartment was a St. Nicholas medal belonging to a boy named Finn O’Sullivan (Nolan Gerard Funk). After returning the lost item to Finn while both he and Audrey were 11 years-old, the two became friends, and Molly began a tradition of finding items at the beach to then return to their rightful owner.

Now, years later, Audrey is an adult, and Molly has one last quest for her. In the secret spot are five gold rings and a note instructing Audrey to team up with Finn, who by now has taken over for his late father’s business as a private investigator, to track down the origins of each ring and return them to their rightful owners. What ensues is a cozy, low-stakes mystery that ends up not only reuniting people with treasured items, but also potentially turning longtime childhood friends Audrey and Finn into something more, and maybe even helping Audrey rediscover her passion for art in the process.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: More than a movie, Five Gold Rings actually reminds me of Gilmore Girls. Led by three generations of women, the Miller family has single mom Kay raising bright, only daughter Audrey in a cozy small town, where they live in a surprisingly large home considering Kay runs a small family business.

Audrey goes from struggling at chasing her dreams in a big city to return to her charming hometown to start over and maybe even find love with a guy from her past, while Kay falls for a local blue-collar guy who has always pined for her. If that’s not the Hallmark version of Lorelei and Rory Gilmore I don’t know what is!

Performance Worth Watching: Holland Roden is pretty darn charming as Audrey Miller and is as natural as anyone can be in a Hallmark movie. She has good chemistry with practically everyone that she’s onscreen with, which makes her scenes consistently engaging to watch.

Memorable Dialogue: It wouldn’t be a Hallmark movie without some good old-fashioned exposition:

“Audrey, you don’t have to spend your vacation on a wild goose chase.”

“This is grandma’s tradition. Find lost items and do everything you can to find the owners by Christmas. It’s an incredible gift she’s given me. I would be more than happy to accept this quest.”

“I wonder if Finn will feel the same way?”

A Holiday Tradition:Every year there’s a Christmas Giving Gala, raising money for Springside Food Pantry. There’s even a big art contest where the winner gets to see grand prize amount donated to the local charity of their choice. It’s also a contest that somehow, resident artist Audrey has never won. Sounds rigged to me!

Does the Title Make Any Sense?:It sure does! Five Gold Rings is not only a line from “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” but also describes the literally five rings that drive the story, and Audrey’s budding relationship with Finn, forward.

Our Take: Five Gold Rings may be cheesy and extremely earnest in the way that Hallmark movies tend to be, but its mystery aspect keeps things from feeling completely predictable. Sure we still know how it’s all going to end, but the moments of discovery with the five gold rings and their little stories carried enough originality and surprises to keep things feeling relatively fun and fresh. Additionally, the whole plot device of needing to find the owners of each ring also cleverly separated the movie into a natural five act structure that felt well-paced and focused from beginning to end.

Holland Roden and Nolan Gerard Funk have nice, comfortable chemistry as romantic leads, and their blossoming connecting was overall pleasant to watch, even if they were obviously down bad for each other for the start (especially Funk’s Finn, wow, what a flirt). It feels like, though, the heart of this movie is familial love and connection, and we feel that through Molly’s intricately planned quest for Audrey, and Audrey’s sweet, close relationship with her mom.

So even though there are, of course, absurd or goofy things, like people in the Midwest being lightly dressed for winter, an over-the-top snooty rival antique store owner, or adults making a snowman with a random teen because one of them has never made a snowman before (he grew up in Minnesota, how is that possible), the good outweighs the bad and leaves a positive impression in the end.

Our Call: STREAM IT! While it likely won’t rock your world, Five Gold Rings is easy, charming viewing that makes for a solid way to kick off your early Christmas movie streaming this season.