Apache Gold

Apache Gold (Winnetou 1. Teil, 1963) is a West German adventure western directed by Harald Reinl you can watch online on iFILM. Based on Karl May's adventure novels, it follows Old Shatterhand — a German surveyor played by Lex Barker — who uncovers a plot by the criminal Santer to reroute a planned railroad through Apache sacred land to reach a hidden gold deposit. When Shatterhand sides with the tribe, he earns the friendship of their chief's son, the Apache warrior Winnetou.

Pierre Brice stepped into the role of Winnetou and never really stepped out of it — he played the character in more than a dozen films through 1968, becoming one of the most recognizable figures in European adventure cinema. The Yugoslav locations (Croatian mountains and canyons standing in for the American West) give the film a rawness no studio backlot could fake.

Karl May's Winnetou stories were a cultural institution in German-speaking Europe. This first film captures what made the books endure: not the action, but the friendship between two men from different worlds who choose each other anyway. Stream Apache Gold (1963) on iFILM.