Berlin based feature film and TV animation production company is looking for an experienced Line Producer, leading up to a position as Head of (Animation) Production. Applicant should be a senior production professional with an extensive background in planning, structuring, managing and overseeing CG (and ideally 2D) animation productions and should be interested in a long-term
engagement at our headquarters in Berlin.
We look forward to your application (English or German CV and ideally salary expectations/history) at bewerbung@akkord.film!
Line Producer Animation (Head of Production) [m/w/d] (32-40 hrs/wk)
Our favourite apple witch PETRONELLA will finally cast her spells again! Starting August 8th, all 39 magical episodes will re-run on German KiKA, Monday to Friday at 08:10 am.
Petronella will once again sprinkle all her fans with magic and conjure her way – zip zap – into the hearts of new viewers.
How wonderful that after the successful first run, Petronella’s adventures are going into a second round!
Starting tomorrow (February 10), THE ELFKINS will be shown in more than 280 South Korean cinemas! The Korean trailer can be found here– and if you’ve always wanted to hear Elfie and her friends sing in Korean, you can do so here. Special thanks to the Korean distributor Boxoo Entertainment. 감사합니다 (Thank you!)
The Elfkins, Los Elfkins, Гномы в деле!, É Doce!, Tí Hon Hậu Đậu – Elfie and her friends are delighting audiences around the globe! Some of their “would tour” highlights so far: They opened among the top 5 of the British box office charts, filled over 1139 movie screens in Russia, and mesmerized visitors in Vietnam (748 cinemas) and Brazil. In 2021, THE ELFKINS have, besides Spain (200 screens), finally even reached Australia (92 cinemas) and New Zealand (46 cinemas) – in all three countries, the film started screening in mid-January!
“¡Conquistarán tu cocina!” (They will conquer your kitchen!) is the slogan for THE ELFKINS (Spanish title: LOS ELFKINS), as the film starts on 200 screens all across Spain. The premieres in Barcelona and Madrid were a huge success already. For nationwide exploitation, the film was, besides Spanish, translated into Catalan and Basque. Our great “thank you!” goes to Spanish distributor VERCINE DISTRIBUCIÓN for their elaborate campaign – we are thrilled that Elfie and her friends are now conquering the kitchens (and hearts) of the Spanish audience!
We’re starting the year with great news for Elfie and her friends! THE ELFKINS – BAKING A DIFFERENCE received the award for Best Film at the Giffoni International Film Festival (Italy) in the age section “Elements +6”.
It is a special honor for us to be awarded at the 50th anniversary of one of the world’s most prestigious children’s film festivals.
Already in November, THE ELFKINS won the Children’s Jury’s Prize for “Best Animated Feature” at the Chicago International Children’s Film Festival. Both Festivals – Chicago and Giffoni – are on the German national film fund’s list of the six most important festivals in children’s entertainment. Overall, THE ELFKINS were screened in competition at two more festivals on this list ( “Goldener Spatz” in Erfurt/Gera and “Schlingel” in Chemnitz).
We can’t stop cheering!
Such an honor for Helvi and her friends! THE ELFKINS – BAKING A DIFFERENCE won the Children´s Jury´s Prize for Best Animated Feature Film at this year‘s Chicago International Children´s Film Festival!
The CICFF is one of the largest and most renowned film festivals for children and one of only two Oscar-qualifying children’s film festivals in the world. We are very happy that after our successful box office start in the UK, our little Elfkins continue to inspire and bring joy to audiences all around the world!
The premiere of our animated series PETRONELLA APPLEWITCH on KiKA, one of Germany’s prominent tv stations for children, met with huge success. The first 26 episodes about charming Applewitch Petronella and her small and big friends aired daily during primetime at 6:35 pm, starting October 10th and reaching up to 68.9 % of 3-5-year-olds and 46.7 % of 6-9-year-olds.* Since November 8th the little witch has also been casting her imaginative spells on ZDF every Sunday. The series was extensively featured online with episodes and bonus material on the websites, HbbTV and apps of ZDF and KiKA. It achieved high VoD ratings (700.000 views via KiKA alone) and reached, among others, the online top 10 on KiKA (1st place on KiKA HbbTV).
*Data: AGF Videoforschung in collaboration with GfK; VIDEOSCOPE 1.4, 11/10/2020-06/12/2020
This October, our little helpers can be seen on a whopping 459 cinema screens throughout the UK & Ireland (via Signature Entertainment www.signature-entertainment.co.uk/film/the-elfkins/). The film opened among the Top 5 of the British Box Office charts, marking a giant success for a German film. We are very proud and congratulate all partners and collaborators involved.
The festival journey continues! Our Elfkins movie can be seen in competition at this year’s hybrid edition of the “Golden Sparrow –Children’s Film and Media Festival” and will hopefully win over the children jury members’ hearts. We are proud of competing with three other excellent films and keep our fingers crossed for our hard-working helpers. Their adventures will be screened on September 22nd at 9am and 3:30pm and on September 24th at 2pm in Gera and via online festival tickets.
Starting 11/10/2020, charismatic PETRONELLA APPLEWITCH will put a charm on small and big spectators alike every day at 6:35 pm on KiKA, one of Germany’s prime tv-channels for children. The 26×11′ episodes will also be aired on ZDF, with a further 13 episodes to follow in 2021 on KiKA and ZDF.
The charming stories about the chaotic apple witch and her friends were realized in co-production with SERU Animation and ZDF, in collaboration with 2Minutes, France, and produced by Akkord Film (Dirk Beinhold and Maite Woköck). They are based on a bestselling book series by Sabine Städing and SaBine Büchner. The series‘ concept was developed by Jan Strathmann and Heike Sperling, Emilie Rimetz directed the series. The score was composed by Cherilyn MacNeil.
Great news for all friends of the Easter rabbits: RABBIT SCHOOL – HUNT FOR THE GOLDEN EGG will be broadcasted on German TV on Good Friday, April 10th at 7.30 pm prime time on KiKA and alternatively in numerous other programs over the holidays. Akkord Film wishes everyone a happy and healthy Easter with your loved ones.
Since January 30th 2020, Elfie, Kipp, Buck and their friends are rockin’ it Elfkin-style on 575 cinemas in German speaking Europe! After only two weekends, more than 180,000 small and big ELFKIN-fans have already experienced the adventures of our little heroes. For those who like to do it the Elfkin-style at home and need some musical support: The brilliant soundtrack incl. the song WIR HEINZELN DAS aka IT’S ELFKIN STYLE is available here.
After almost 30 years of international experience in various roles of animation and VFX production and management, including as Associate Producer for animated feature films at Lucasfilm (Singapore) and Executive VFX Producer for Hollywood feature films at Framestore and Rodeo FX (Canada), she most recently was CEO of Hahn Film AG. Imke is also actively involved with the global organization Women in Animation and is a co-founder of the German group Animationsfrauen Deutschland. Together with Akkord Film’s founder and CEO, Dirk Beinhold, Imke Fehrmann will strategically co-lead the company and will also be responsible for all productions as Executive Producer. We are very happy that Imke has become part of the Akkord Team!
We are delighted that THE ELFKINS is one of eight children’s films to be shortlisted for the German Film Award! We would like to thank the pre-selection committee. In German speaking countries, the little helpers are jumping onto the big screen January 30th 2020. World sales are handled by Sola Media, and the film will be screened several times at the Berlin Film Festival.
Just on time for the holiday season, cheeky Raven celebrated the premiere of our new children’s film “Raven the Little Rascal – Hunt For the Lost Treasure”. Young and old fans got together at Kulturbrauerei Berlin to watch the new adventure of Raven and his friends and to join their exciting treasure hunt. Little Raven rocked the red carpet with Sandor Jesse and Verena Fels (directors), Oliver Zeller (Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg), Jan Delay (Little Raven), Anna Thalbach (Mrs. Badger), Dirk Beinhold (producer), Nellie Thalbach (Little Badger), Florian Schmidt-Prange (co-producer), Katja Grübel (screenplay) and Jutta Bose (Universum Film) (from left to right).
The Elfkins are back! Hidden well under the earth’s surface for many, many years, the hard-working little helpers will return in 2020 to sweep audiences young and old off their feet with their creativity, craftsmanship, humor and lots of Elfkin power. After a successful festival premiere at the German “Schlingel” Festival, the Elfkins can now be seen in our new trailer! Enjoy it before the German theatrical release on January 30th, 2020, followed by worldwide releases throughout 2020.
This time our little treasure hunters travel to Portugal where they will continue their adventure at this year´s CINANIMA Film Festival. We are very excited and delighted about the invitation!
At this year’s Cartoon Forum in Toulouse, the biggest European pitching event for animated TV series, Animation Germany invited to a panel discussion focusing on European series co-productions. Over 50 producers, investors and broadcasters from Germany, France, Belgium and Luxembourg met at the event “EU Co-Productions for Series – Producer´s Heaven or Hell”. Akkord’s CEO, Dirk Beinhold, hosted the panel, introducing case studies from three German-European co-productions by Scopas AG and Fabrique Fantastique (Belgium), MotionWorks and Melusine Productions (Luxembourg) and a collaboration by Akkord and 2MInutes (France).
After 250 years, they are back! From 30 January 2020, film fans of all ages can enjoy the adventures of the Elfkin family on the big screen throughout Germany. But Elfie, Kipp and Buck will already be on their way from Cologne to Chemnitz in October to celebrate their world premiere at the International Film Festival SCHLINGEL. We are very happy to be taking part in this year’s competition “Blickpunkt Deutschland” and would like to thank the entire festival team.
The General Assembly of Animation in Europe, the federation of European Animation Producer Associations, elected its board for the next two years during its annual meeting at MIFA in Annecy last week. The following candidates, who bring together an extensive range of TV, movie, production and distribution experience, were elected to the board: Philippe Alessandri (Watch Next Media – France) as Chairman, Annemie Degryse (Lumiere Publishing/ Lunanime – Belgium) as Treasurer and Moe Honan (Moetion Films – Ireland), Dirk Beinhold (Akkord Film Produktion GmbH – Germany) and Tom van Waveren (CAKE – Netherlands) will serve as Vice Chairs. Mar Sáez Pedrero (PRO-ANIMATS – Spain) was subsequently asked to continue as General Secretary. We are very proud of being elected and congratulate the other board members!
Before the official theatrical release, young and old fans could experience the cheeky little raven at two film festivals and join in the excitement of the big treasure hunt which began in May at ITFS Festival in Stuttgart. This week, Raven met the Golden Sparrow at the film festival by the same name in Gera and Erfurt where they greeted an enthusiastic audience. Little Raven will fly across the screens all over Germany starting December 12th.
We are very happy to welcome Angela at Akkord Film to oversee all our physical production work. She most recently supervised the production of Wes Anderson’s stop-motion indie ISLE OF DOGS and was part of the production team of Jan Lachauer, Jakob Schuh and Bin-Han To’s REVOLTING RHYMES. Both were nominated for an Academy Award. She also supervised MAYA THE BEE for German studio M.A.R.K. 13. We are proud to have her on board for our expanding international productions in the coming years!
RAVEN THE LITTLE RASCAL returns to German TV channel KiKA from May 20th till June 24th! There will be two episodes each morning at 08:05am Mondays to Fridays. Here you can find an overview over all episodes and dates. The episodes are also available on German DVDs.
After rocking the big screen two Easters in a row, RABBIT SCHOOL – GUARDIANS OF THE GOLDEN EGG can now be seen on German and Austrian Free TV for the first time. If you would like to join Max and his friends on his big adventure, you can tune in – on April 19th at 7:30pm and on April 21st at 1:30pm on KiKA, as well as on April 22nd at 6:25am on NDR and on April 21st at 8:35am on ORF. Akkord Film wishes Happy Easter!
We are proud to announce that RAVEN THE LITTLE RASCAL – HUNT FOR THE LOST TREASURE was selected to take part in feature film competition at the “Golden Sparrow” film festival. Audiences can accompany Little Raven on his exciting treasure hunt June 3rd at 9 am in Gera and June 5th at 2 pm in Erfurt. The movie’s wide theatrical release in Germany will follow December 12th, 2019. World sales are handled by Beta Film.
RABBIT ACADEMY – THE EGG FORCE going into production this year. The many supporters from Germany and Austria are Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein (FFHSH), Medien- und Filmgesellschaft Baden-Württemberg (MFG), HessenFilm und Medien, Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, nordmedia Film- und Medienges. Niedersachsen/Bremen, German Federal Film Board (FFA), Filmfonds Wien (FFW), and Österreichisches Filminstitut (ÖFI). The Akkord Film team is looking forward to exciting collaboration with co-producers Arx Anima in Vienna, Seru Film, Universum Film and public ARD broadcasters NDR, SWR and HR.
The German voice actors of Raven’s new movie adventure are currently having fun in the dubbing studio: This marks the third time that singer Jan Delay (right) lends cheeky Raven his unmistakable voice while Germany’s legendary actor, Dieter Hallervorden, speaks the role Grandpa Badger for the first time. Renowned actress Anna Thalbach can be heard as Mrs. Badger, while her daughter, Nellie Thalbach, voices Little Badger. World sales are handled by Beta Film.
The turbulent treasure hunt will launch in German cinemas on December 12th, 2019.
One year before theatrical release, journalists stopped by to take a sneak peek at the production of new animated feature film THE ELFKINS. The filmmakers, together with director Ute von Münchow-Pohl and Professor Carl Bergengruen, the CEO of MFG Film Fund Baden-Württemberg, provided background information on the project and gave practical insight into the production process of a CG-animated feature film. On September 12th 2019, the ELFKINS will finally leave their underground home to conquer the cinema screens.
German regional film fund Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein awards 450.000 Euro to Akkord’s new feature film project, RABBIT ACADEMY – THE EGG FORCE, to be directed by Ute von Münchow-Pohl based on a script by Katja Grübel and Dagmar Rehbinder for a theatrical release in 2021. Many thanks from the entire team!