• Promo, Friday, March 5, 2010 11:01 AM

For its upcoming "Repo Man," a movie set in the future where artificial human organs can be reclaimed for non-payment, Universal Pictures has launched an integrated outdoor/mobile campaign in 15 U.S. cities that uses barcodes and an elaborate role-playing game involving a real-life manhunt for four people, Brian Quinton reports.

In the movie, repossession teams scan bar codes built into the synthetic organs to confirm that the owners are in arrears. In the real world, users can scan a small barcode in the corner of movie posters into iPhones equipped with software from Red Laser, decode them and link to pages of apparent sales brochures for artificial organs.

"It doesn't happen too often that we are able to promote a movie using creative in a way that ties it so closely to a technology," says Ben Blatt, digital marketing manager for Universal. "We've wanted to do a few mobile extensions in the past but didn't have the right fit."

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