Summaries

Synopsis

Singer Patricia Paradise has everything: beauty, fame, success, money... Though her 40th birthday inevitably approaches, she more and more feels desperate to get the only thing missing in her life: a child. Leaving her successful career and Las Vegas forever in order to build her family in a healthy environment was long prevented by Katherine Hiller, her discoverer and business manager. This spider-woman, secretly connected to the mob, has jealously controlled Patricia's life as well as the one of Patricia's husband, casino owner Francis Hiller. Katherine is his half-sister. His enormous debts with the mafia did put a lot of pressure on his marriage - he continually pushes Patricia to keep her career going.Suddenly, Francis mysteriously disappears. The word in Las Vegas is that he is dead. But Patricia, as she confides to her good-hearted maid Maria, is convinced that her husband got away and awaits her in 'Shangri-La', the fabulous get-away-paradise where she will fulfill her infinite happiness of a family. Patricia is able to escape Las Vegas, not before having had to overcome the heavily threatening Katherine and a brutal nurse who was ordered to keep her constantly drugged.After hours of driving through the Nevada desert, the taxi driver abruptly quits of the search of this Shangri-La. He demands that the pay, then angrily rapes Patricia. At this moment of highest desperation, Patricia's guardian angel, grandfather-like Simon, conveys strength and faith. She is able to flee into the desert and to hide in a deserted shack. Mysteriously, she gets to see the wise angel who explains that her dream place can be anywhere, even at a rotten shack where she is right now. Though, as her husband always has prevented her realization of this fact, she must be true to her own heart. With a knock at the door, a rejuvenated Francis appears. He charmingly convinces her to reverse all her plans in order to continue her career. On their way back to Las Vegas, they pass the Death Valley. Patricia increasingly becomes suspicious that this arrogant man impossibly can be her beloved husband - he indeed is Douglas, a perfect look-a-like of her Francis. Shocked, all of Patricia's dreams fall apart. But again, her guardian angel reactivates her will to live. And yes, suddenly she spots her beloved who wanders over sand dunes. By following him, the exhausted Patricia reaches an oasis she is convinced being her eternal 'Shangri-La'.But the man, despite his close looks of Francis, is indeed Henry. He is a park ranger, contently living with his father, Henry Sr. - another mysterious incarnation, as he just looks like the angel Simon. Henry bears a much more refined character than Francis. Patricia is in seventh heaven. Her goal of happiness is achieved, a life in Shangri-La, with a harmonic family complete with her offspring Alan.Eighteen years of unique happiness pass by. But slowly, their teenage-son Alan got obsessed that sterile Henry can't possibly be his father. Even worse, he nags at the thought of Henry having killed his real father who must be Douglas, the one Patricia had spent a night with back in the desert-shack. Henry can't stand these incriminations and, deadly hurt, he passes away. Ashamed, Alan escapes to the excessive Las Vegas, devastating Patricia even more so. Now, she suddenly is all-alone at her dream-place Shangri-La.Her guarding angel Simon, the true incarnation of the good grandfather, calms his protégé: Genuine happiness only comes from within. Patricia regains her joy of life - although living in complete isolation.As the years pass by, the aged Patricia gets a visit by...Francis. But does she realize, that this Francis, or is it Henry, or even Douglas, is in reality her grown up son Alan...?