In 1962, Wendlandt teamed up with the director Harald Reinl to make Der Schatz im Silbersee (The Treasure of Silver Lake), based on the frontier stories of the late 19th- century German writer Karl May. Filmed in Yugoslavia with the American actor Lex Barker and the Frenchman Pierre Brice in the lead roles, this tongue-in-cheek adventure proved extremely popular with European audiences Other Karl May adventures followed. Rival producers jumped on the bandwagon and by 1964 some two dozen German, Italian and Spanish westerns had been made. Wendlandt’s films were ignored by the more serious, art- orientated German film critics, who sometimes regarded them as opium for the masses.Perhaps in part to confound his critics, Wendlandt went into partnership with the avant-garde German directors Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Volker Schloendorff. He put money into Fassbinder’s Lili Marleen (1980), Lola (1981), and Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss (1982, “Veronika Voss’s Longing”). He was proud that Ingmar Bergman’s first film made outside Sweden, Schlangenei (The Serpent’s Egg) was produced by Rialto in 1977. It was about a Jewish-American circus acrobat trying to survive in poverty-stricken 1920s Germany and starred David Carradine and Liv Ullmann.Wendlandt received many awards over the years, including a Berlinale Kamera at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival.
In 1992, his son Matthias took over the general direction of Rialto Film, deciding to go on making Edgar Wallace films for television.David Childs. GINGER RILEY MUNDUWALAWALA was one of the strongest and most individual voices in Australian contemporary art. His boldly composed, brightly coloured paintings of his native landscape, and the mythological beings that brought that landscape into existence, sounded a new and arresting note. His art helped to break down the distinctions between “Aboriginal” and “contemporary” art. In 1997 he had the distinction of being given a one-man retrospective exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne. Ginger Riley Munduwalawala, artist: born c1937; died Borroloola, Northern Territory 1 September 2002. Although he spent his early life in the bush living a traditional aboriginal existence, he also had contact with the nearby Roper River Mission (now the Ngukurr Aboriginal community), and even attended school there intermittently.In his mid-teens he set off to live the wandering life of a cattle drover and stockman on the vast cattle stations of the Northern Territory.
And it was while driving cattle for Lord Vestey that he visited Alice Springs and met the celebrated Aboriginal watercolourist Albert Namatjira (1902-1959). Namatjira’s beautifully coloured depictions of the desert landscape made a great impression on Riley. He was excited at the possibility of one-day depicting his own country after his own fashion.Although he returned to Ngukurr in the early Seventies, it was some years before he began to fulfil this vision. In 1986 the Northern Territory Education Department ran a print-making course at the community. While others set about printing T-shirt designs, Riley asked for acrylic paints and embarked on a series of large mythological landscapes. Taking off from the bark-painting traditions of the area, he evolved his own highly individual style.His work was quick to gain recognition and win prizes. His relish for bright hues and strong juxtapositions led to the white Australian artist David Larwill dubbing Riley the “Boss of Colour”.
