Helmer Richter gets 'Jungle' fever

UFA pic set to lens later this year

By ED MEZA

BERLIN -- Roland Suso Richter will helm an adaptation of Sabine Kuegler's bestseller "Dschungelkind" (Jungle Child), a biography of Christian missionaries who move to Papua New Guinea with their children to live with the Stone Age Fayu tribe.

Richter will lens the pic on location in Papua New Guinea at the end of 2008 for UFA Cinema after he wraps "Hindenburg," a Teamworx-produced miniseries for RTL Television about the 1937 zeppelin disaster.

Based on a script by Natalie Scharf, "Jungle Child" examines Kuegler's life after her family arrives in the country in 1990, her childhood among indigenous people who had never before had contact with the outside world, and her transformation into a jungle imp who learns to shoot with bow and arrow and eat local delicacies like grilled bat wings, snake and fat white grubs.

UFA's recently announced productions include "Hanni & Nanni," Christine Hartmann's adaptation of Enid Blyton's 1940s children's book series "St. Clares," and "Mein Kampf," an adaptation by Urs Odermatt of George Tabori's theatrical work focusing on Hitler as a young man in Vienna.

A regular helmer for Teamworx's big-event TV productions, Richter directed its hit 2006 World War II drama "Dresden" for pubcaster ZDF as well as its upcoming terrorist drama "Mogadishu" for fellow pubcaster ARD.

Teamworx topper Nico Hofmann also heads UFA Cinema along with Juergen Schuster, Wolf Bauer and Thomas Friedl. Both Teamworx and UFA Cinema are divisions of UFA Film & TV Prods.