Wieland Schulz-Keil began his career in the 1970s producing documentaries for German, Canadian, Japanese and American television. Among his better-known films were "The New Deal for Artists", about the cultural politics of FDR's administration, "German Film Emigration", a multi-part profile of filmmakers who fled the Nazis, and "Shamans in the Blind Country", about a tribe in Nepal.

In the 1980s, Schulz-Keil segued to producing feature films, including John Huston's "Under the Volcano" (1983) and that filmmaker's final picture "The Dead" (1987). Other credits include Michael Almereyda's "Twister" (1989), Axel Corti's "The King's Whore" (1990), John Schlesinger's "The Innocent" (1993, released in 1995), Ildiko Enyedi's "Freischultz/The Magic Hunter" (1994), Enki Bilal's "Tykho Moon" (1995) and Werner Schroeter's "Poussieres d'amour/Love's Debris" (1996).