'Home' documentary a risk for Gucci parent PPR

LOS ANGELES - A new film about human excess and its impact on Earth's fragile ecosystem debuts Friday, marking an unusual risk for its financial backer, one of the planet's biggest retailing conglomerates, France's PPR SA.

PPR, the maker of Gucci leather handbags and Puma shoes, paid 10 million euros of the 12-million-euro production budget to create "Home," a documentary that will debut in 127 countries on June 5, World Environmental Day.

In it, filmmaker Yann Arthus-Bertrand mixes stunningly beautiful natural landscapes with a critical monologue about human consumption, along with aerial footage of our destructive footprint on the planet.

His eye swerves from the African plains to a sea of plastic-topped vegetable greenhouses in Spain and "concentration camp-style cattle farms" where the narrator says "not a blade of grass grows."

Oil-rich and development-crazy Dubai gets a special mention as a "new beacon for all the world's money" and is criticized for having endless sun but no solar-powered electricity.

"Nothing seems further removed from nature than Dubai," the narrator states. "Although nothing depends on nature more than Dubai. We haven't understood that we're depleting what nature provides."

Laurent Claquin, senior vice president of corporate social and environmental responsibility at PPR, said the company took a chance on the film.

"It's true we're putting ourselves at risk in a way," said "We're not perfect yet. We're never going to be perfect. But we have a duty to act."

PPR co-financed the production with French public broadcaster France 2 and the Qatar Foundation.

PPR Chief Executive Francois-Henri Pinault, whose family controls the company, insisted the film be given away for free to distributors. As a result, it is being shown at discounted rates in some theaters, for free in open-air screenings, on YouTube and 80 TV channels, and sold, sometimes at a discount, on DVDs around the world.

In May, Pinault told a press conference: "This film commits us not to consume less, but to consume differently."

The film is narrated in English by Glenn Close, in Spanish by Salma Hayek — also Pinault's wife — and in 15 other languages.

In the United States, the film will be run on the National Geographic Channel at 9 p.m. Friday Eastern and Pacific time and be released on home video by News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox.

National Geographic Channel spokesman Russell Howard said the network will run ads and collect revenue during the screening, but it bumped programming on its popular Friday night when it usually reaches about 3 million people.

"This is no bonanza for us," he said. "It's really an opportunity to be part of the global effort."

David Bixler, a senior vice president of acquisitions at 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, said he expects the film to sell more than 100,000 units, including through digital downloads on such places as Amazon.com.

It is selling at regular prices that coincide with a suggested retail price of $19.98 on DVD.

Fifteen percent of the studio's profits will go to Conservation International.

"I don't think we're looking to make a lot of money," he said. "We're looking to make a statement."

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On the Net:

Home, http://www.home-2009.com

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