EDF's 'The Race' flew fantasy riders over nuclear plants and wind farms, then paused

Explain how EDF generates 97 per cent of its electricity with zero CO2 emissions from a mix of nuclear, hydro, wind, solar and thermal sources.

Show EDF's low-carbon mix as a thrilling race through production sites, which turns out to be a video game a family has to stop.

Director Thierry Poiraud made a fully 3D film in which characters on imaginary mounts fly at full speed above villages, forests and fields, and also solar panels, hydroelectric dams, wind farms and nuclear plants, set to Zizi Jeanmaire's 'Mon truc à plumes'. It stops abruptly on a scene of everyday life: a father and his children pausing a video game. Mathematic did the ultra-realistic pictures, and the ad has several endings that change over months while the flight stays identical. It launched on 17 September 2017 across TV, digital, cinema and social.

The LBB report, published at launch, gives no audience or sales results. EDF communications director Julien Villeret said the brand dared to use an entertaining storyline for a tricky subject, and the agency said it hoped to appeal to all generations, especially young people.

In September 2017 EDF launched 'The Race', the centrepiece of a new campaign made by Havas Paris. The aim was to communicate EDF's energy mix: according to the LBB report, 97 per cent of its electricity is produced with zero CO2 emissions from nuclear, hydro, wind, solar and thermal sources.

Rather than a diagram, the film is a fantastical roller-coaster ride in which riders on imaginary mounts race over rural France and EDF's production sites. Havas's Christophe Coffre said it shows how EDF's methods mirror the way French people use electricity, in a celebratory way. The ending stops the race in everyday life and rotates through a selection of endings over several months, while the fantasy flight is the same every time.

Flying over the sites gives a dry energy mix a visual form that audiences enjoy.

The game-pause ending ties the fantasy back to a family living room.

EDF had spent three years building a friendly, humorous voice, so the entertainment angle fit.

A hard subject like an energy mix can be carried by a spectacle first, with the explanation tucked behind it.

The report notes EDF's earlier electRIC saga from June 2014 and Snapchat and Facebook work as the base the new film built on, and records no results for 'The Race'.