In the bargain bin

Hairy heroine Nariko’s real-life alter ego Anna Torv may be present and correct, but that doesn’t look like it’s going to save Blockade Entertainment’s cinematic Heavenly Sword adaptation from plunging to the pits of Hades. The curious flick seems to have been in production for an eternity, and now it finally has a 2nd September release date in North America.

Following the events of the PlayStation 3 adventure, the movie looks like it’s been rendered using last-gen hardware in order to maintain authenticity – seriously, this doesn’t look like a cutting edge computer graphics production, does it? Veteran thespian Andy Serkis is unsurprisingly out, but Spider-Man 2 star Alfred Molina has stepped in to fill King Bohan’s big boots.

Should you pick up the straight-to-video affair on Blu-ray or DVD, you’ll unlock access to a bunch of behind-the-scenes material, including interviews with the cast and crew. We’re going to assume that everyone involved is going to look a little embarrassed, because we’re not entirely sure why this got made. Still, kudos to the creators for following the project through – er, we guess.

[source youtube.com, via uk.ign.com]