小成本大场面：围观英国人拍的中国武打片大纲
两位名不见经传的英国电影制片人，在德比郡为中国史诗战争动作片《英雄帝国》拍了一支预告片，希望能够成功吸引来好莱坞的注意。It has all the ingredients of a movie blockbuster: sword-wielding warriors in period costume set against an Ancient China landscape, complete with stunning sunsets, rolling fields and snowcapped mountains. Except this isn't China at all... it's the Peak District, in Derbyshire.
5分钟的预告片中包含了所有巨制大片的元素：身着年代服装挥动刀剑的战士，背景是中国古代的山水风景，还有绚丽的落日、起伏的稻田和白雪皑皑的山顶。不过这完全不是中国，这是德比郡的山峰区（Peak District）。
John Watts and Thomas Wood had a shoestring budget of £20,000 and needed to call on Chinese waiters in their home town of Sheffield to bulk out the cast in battle scenes.
约翰·瓦特和托马斯·伍德仅有2万英镑不到的预算，为了凑齐战斗场面所需的大批群众演员，甚至需要打电话到他们家乡谢菲尔德，找那里中国餐馆的服务员来参演。
After the trailer drew 80,000 YouTube views in two weeks, however, the pair are in talks about turning their script into an £8million production.
预告片上传到YouTube两周之内，点击率直窜到8万，于是两人考虑用这个剧本制成一部约800万英镑的电影。
‘Instead of spending our meagre budget trying to make a cheap film, we boiled the script down to just five minutes and made the best trailer we could,’ said Mr Watts, 32.
“与其将我们仅有的预算制成一部廉价电影，我们宁愿将剧本浓缩到5分钟，尽力制成最好的预告片。”32岁的瓦特这样说道。
The ever-changing English climate worked in the pair’s favour on the three-day shoot, with bright sunshine, rain and fog.
英格兰天气的变化莫测，但在他们拍摄的三天里却十分配合，出过太阳、下过雨，也起过雾。
‘It helped give the trailer an epic look, like we’d been filming over several months,’ said Mr Watts.
“这使得预告片有了史诗一般的效果，就好像我们已经拍了好几个月。” 瓦特说。
But if the US-backed production goes ahead, its directors will leave the picturesque landscape of the peaks behind to shoot it in China.
不过如果好莱坞方面能支持拍摄，导演们就会离开这个风景如画的山区，而转到中国拍摄。
