Universal Pictures has turned to Apple's iPhone to promote its comedy-adventure "Land of the Lost," starring Will Ferrell, which opens in U.S. theaters on June 5.

The film giant tapped Dallas-based Blockdot for the launch of the free iPhone game "Land of the Lost: Crystal Adventure." While the demographic for this film is a four-quadrant campaign going after almost everyone, in the iPhone space for this particular game, Universal is expecting the 12-24 crowd to engage the most.

"The strategy is to reach users in the mobile space with a casual game that they will enjoy, but also introduce them to the film," said Ben Blatt, manager of digital marketing for Universal Pictures, Universal City, CA. "We find that the best way to reach users in the mobile and online space in terms of producing games is to give people something that will stand on its own two feet as a fun and engaging experience and then bring in the film branding as secondary.

"That way someone can pick up their iPhone and play all 25 levels of this fantastic game while they are also being exposed to great Will Ferrell soundbites and film clips," he said. "The games and applications in the marketplace that don't try to engage the user, but rather to simply put out a piece of content for the sake of supporting the film, can sometimes do more harm than good."

In "Land of the Lost," Will Ferrell stars as has-been scientist Dr. Rick Marshall, sucked into a space-time vortex and spat back through time.

Now, Dr. Marshall has no weapons, few skills and questionable smarts to survive in an alternate universe full of marauding dinosaurs and fantastic creatures from beyond our world -- a place of spectacular sights and super-scaled comedy known as the Land of the Lost.

Blockdot, a Media General Inc. company, is a producer and provider of interactive entertainment and advergaming technologies.

Blockdot has created more than 800 games for a broad range of brands and companies, including American Airlines, Verizon, AT&T, Baskin-Robbins, Kimberly-Clark, Kraft, Motorola, M&Ms, Nokia, T.G.I. Friday's and Universal Pictures.

Its gaming site is at http://www.kewlbox.com.

In the "Land of the Lost" iPhone game, Dr. Rick Marshall -- played by Will Ferrell -- is trapped inside a Sleestak temple.

Gamers can guide Dr. Marshall through the temple by pushing blocks, building bridges over pits and navigating around obstacles, all while avoiding the Sleestaks.

Players collect the small crystals during the journey, which earn them points. If they reach the crystal table, they will take Dr. Marshall to the next level of the Sleestak temple.

After completing a few levels, gamers can watch clips of the movie or check out photos of the sites that appear in the "Land of the Lost" film.

Consumers can download the game for free at the Apple iTunes store. There will be no ads in the application.

"The application was developed by Universal at a cost to us, but we will not be monetizing the downloads," Mr. Blatt said. "The application is available for free so users can enjoy the game as a promotional vehicle for the movie."

Universal Pictures is using several tactics to get the word out about the Land of the Lost.

"We are using all of our destination sites to promote Land of the Lost, including an official Web site and social networking pages," Mr. Blatt said. "We are doing publicity outreach directly to Web sites, bloggers and the press, and we will eventually be tagging some of our paid media with callouts to download the game."

Universal Pictures is also working with Apple to promote the iPhone game within the iTunes store and on http://www.apple.com.

In addition, there will be a very large online advertising campaign promoting the movie, as well as a mobile campaign.

"Some of this will directly promote the iPhone game, but the vast majority will focus on the film," Mr. Blatt said. "The publisher list is too large to share, but in the month of May we will have a broad presence in the digital space."