The Sony Pictures film Inferno is built on puzzles, symbols, and hidden meaning, so the campaign had to be as well. Instead of a traditional launch, I turned the film into a real-world experience: a Dan Brown adventure you could actually play.
The campaign didn’t just promote Inferno, it invited fans to think, solve, and explore the world the same way the story does.
At the center was the “Race to Inferno”, a global influencer event set in Singapore where teams had to solve clues, decode messages, and complete challenges as they moved through nine metaphorical levels of Hell. The entire experience was designed to feel like stepping inside a Robert Langdon story – part puzzle, part competition, part live-action narrative.
For the digital campaign I hid a secret link at the end of the first teaser trailer. Fans who found and tapped on the hidden YouTube annotation on the "Cerca Trova" flag were then taken to another video.
This hidden video was a 360° experience that went inside Botticelli's "La Mappa dell'Inferno" painting to explore the 9 Layers of Hell depicted in that masterpiece.
Influencers received custom boxes seeded with clues, including a hidden map revealed through heat, before being dropped into a day-long journey at Marina Bay Sands.
The event took place at the Marina Bay Sands resort in Singapore, and featured a day long event where the influencers journeyed through 9 metaphorical levels of hell as they solved riddles, performed tasks, and lived a Dan Brown adventure.
With Dan Brown's feedback and approval, I wrote and directed 9 video clues with Ron Howard. These video clues launched each mission, which then included further ciphers, secret messages, and hidden passages in the resort.
