When Sngmoo Lee’s debut film was initially announced, the title was Laundry Warrior. Now that far more distinctive title has been ditched for the less provocative, perhaps even less mysterious, The Warrior’s Way. A promo reel for the Wuxia Western - think Samurai swordplay on the old West frontier - has appeared to leak online, via YouTube where it was discovered by 24fps. As it is unofficial and premature, don’t expect it to be entirely indicative of the finished product (as if that was ever true of officially sanctioned trailers anyway) but you can catch it after the break and get, I think, a good idea of the fun in store.

Writer-director Sngmoo Lee was a teacher on NYU’s film course for five years before teaming with Lord of the Rings producer Barrie Osborne to realise this picture. The cast includes Geoffrey Rush as the town drunk and Kate Bosworth as a circus knife act, which by my reckoning equips them both with specialist fighting skills. I’m not entirely sure, by Danny Huston appears to be the bad guy (again) while Jang Dong-gun stars as the heroic fugitive from the East hiding out in the West and, judging from this trailer, he acquits himself admirably:

In particular, I really liked the opening shot with the knife hitting the image in the water, revealing it to be a reflection. Indeed, much of this is stylish stuff, though I do hope the film also succeeds as more than an exercise in stirring and striking images.

As you might expect from Osborne’s involvement, Weta have provided some of the FX with more work carried out by both Antipodean and Korean companies.

As well as the 15 announced set pieces, the film will also reportedly feature “50 carnival tricks”. I’m supposing these will involve Bosworth and her knives, put perhaps a trip to the Bunkum booth for find-the-lady or some stage magic could also be in order. I hope so - I’m a sucker for that stuff.