While visiting Verona, Italy, with her busy fiancé, a young woman named Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) visits a wall where the heartbroken leave notes to Shakespeare's tragic heroine, Juliet Capulet. Finding one such letter from 1957, Sophie decides to write to its now elderly author, Claire (Vanessa Redgrave). Inspired by Sophie's actions, Claire sets out to find her long-lost lover, accompanied by her disapproving grandson (Christopher Egan) and Sophie.