French film group Bac Films has launched its first two home video titles - Scary Movie 2 and Spy Kids - on the rental market through its recently created home video company, Wild Side Video.

Wild Side Video -- a 100% subsidiary of Jean Labadie's Bac Films launched in February 2002 and chaired by Labadie himself -- is headed by former StudioCanal executive Manuel Chiche. Labadie and Chiche have also created Wild Side Films, an outfit meant to acquire all rights to feature films, in which Bac is a majority shareholder (see Screendaily Feb 24).

Physical distribution for Wild Side Video is handled through Universal Pictures Video France. The outfit's slate will include recent films to which Labadie has acquired all rights, such as The Curse Of The Jade Scorpio and The Barber, The Man Who Wasn't There and French sleeper hit Monsieur Batignole. It does not cover StudioCanal's titles distributed theatrically through Bac Film Distribution and Mars Distribution, which are handled on the French home video market by Universal.

Chiche intends to release some 25 titles per year, of which eight to ten will be acquired from independent producers and distributors. Chiche, who was previously in charge of the acquisition and co-production of smaller independent US titles at StudioCanal and most recently of the home video activities of the Vivendi Universal subsidiary, has also created a production company, Wild Side Productions (outside of the partnership with Bac).