Wild Oats 2016

Retired high school teacher Eva loses her husband and, in a twist of fate, receives a staggering $5,000,000 check tied to his modest $50,000 life insurance policy. Her friend Maddie—who has just been abandoned by her husband for a younger woman—encourages Eva to keep the windfall, and the two women set off to Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands to celebrate their new fortunes and indulge in a carefree escape.

Once on the island, Eva draws the attention of an older gentleman who becomes her escort in town. In the lively local casino, she unexpectedly lands a win of nearly half a million euros, astonishing herself because she knows almost nothing about card games. The victory sparks a risky, on-impulse romance, and after a seven-year drought since her husband’s death, Eva finds herself sharing a bed with him, the moment charged with more appetite than she anticipated.

Meanwhile, Maddie isn’t as lucky with her own funds. She loses money, but then meets a young, magnetic man who has just lost his girlfriend and seems to be drawn to older women. Their electric chemistry brings Maddie back to life, a sensation she hasn’t felt in years, though it comes with a physical toll as the affair begins to strain his back.

A separate pressure mounts as an American insurance investigator tracks Eva to recover the $5,000,000 for Beneficial Life Insurance Company, accompanied by her estranged daughter. They run into stone walls—until the European representative for the company accepts a bribe to let Eva slip away rather than returning her to custody or sending her to a grim fate in a Spanish-speaking prison.

As the plot thickens, Maddie realizes the older gentleman is nothing more than a scam artist. With the help of a hotel detective, she uncovers that he works for Don Carlos, the island’s wealthiest and most feared magnate. Eva and Maddie pull away from the pursuing investigator and seek refuge with the feared tycoon. Don Carlos inspires fear in most, save for his flamboyant Brazilian second wife, who challenges him openly when a bodyguard—her lover and the father of her child—falls under pressure from gunfire.

In addition to manipulating older women, Don Carlos is implicated in a wine scam, selling inferior vintages under impressive labels to discerning wine snobs. The culprit is aided by the much-traveled gentleman, who goes by several names, including “Bix,” and who often drops bottles during his schemes.

The tale resolves on a grateful, hopeful note when Don Carlos returns Eva’s winnings. It’s revealed that the cunning Don Carlos once studied abroad in Liberty, Illinois, where Eva was the community’s favorite teacher, a detail remembered fondly by those who helped her along the way.

After settling back the insurance company funds and paying off her hotel bill, Eva still has more than $200,000 to salvage a new future. She shares half with Maddie, who chooses to stay a little longer with her young lover, while Eva returns to the United States. Later, at a seaside ceremony where Eva, her daughter, and others scatter flowers on the ocean, it seems they are paying tribute to someone—likely Maddie. The surprise comes when Maddie is revealed to be alive, thriving, and newly married to her own young partner, completing a story of friendship, luck, and reinvention on a sunlit island.