The Siege of Robin Hood has been a six-year labour of love for Paul Allica.

"We were shooting for about 35-days all-up and 21 days were spent at Kryal Castle," the lead actor, director, producer and editor said.

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"(At the time) they were only open weekends, so we were able to work around that. There's a really amazing community of medieval cosplay re-creators around Ballarat.

"They were really supportive and a lot of them came on board as extras, especially in the cavern and jousting scenes."

"The locals there were fantastic. We couldn't have done it without them." he said.

Allica, who plays Robin Hood, spoke to The Courier hours before flying out to Los Angeles for the American premiere.

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He said the 115-minute film would hit cinemas in Los Angeles, Atlanta, Houston, Tampa and Orlando from June 3 before becoming available on US streaming services and on DVD.

The film. has also been picked up in at least 50 countries including Britain, Brazil, South Korea, Russia, Germany and even Somalia.

"What they want to do with it is up to each country's distributor, whether it goes to cinema, video, streaming or live-to-air television," Allica said.

Allica said the film would be streamed on Stan in Australia and aired on the Nine network later this year.

"About 60 percent of the shots were at Kryal Castle (in Leigh Creek), but we also used Trentham Falls, Olinda, Dingley and the Montsalvat artists colony at Eltham," he said.

"We also had to find an old-style wooden hut with no powerlines, and that was hard.

"We ended up going to a place called Anglers Rest in the High Country, between Omeo and Dinner Plain." he said.

The final product featured more than 500 cast and crew but Allica did most of the editing through lockdown.

"There were 500 visual effects shots, way more than I first thought. For example, we had to digitally paint over any exit signs that were visible - also had to add arrows to some action scenes," Allica said.

"It was painstaking work, but it looks great."

The sound design was overseen by Mark DeAngelo at Melbourne's Backlot Studios. It included adding details such as footsteps, the clanging of swords and the "thwacking" of punches.

"I think the music is a real strong-point of the film," Allica said.

"We got a young composer in Germany to put together an hour of soundtrack."

The plot sees Robin Hood team up with Freyda (Kahli Williams), Merlin (Tom McCathie), Tuck (Keanu Gonzalez), Little John (Peter Roordink) and Lancelot (David Beamish).

They storm a castle and have to battle the Sheriff of Nottingham (David Macrae).

"The film is more about action, than historical accuracy," Allica said.

"There're also some east meets west style shots."

More than 40-minutes of the film is made up of action sequences including viking-style sword fights, long-sword work, archery, acrobatics, explosions, pyrotechnics and Jackie Chan style stunts.

Allica cut his teeth in the Hong Kong film industry, where he said it was rare to find a westerner who was good at King Fu.

"I got to play a lot of villains. You just roll with the punches," he said.

"In fact the first draft for The Siege of Robin Hood was written in China, while we had a three-week break from filming a movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jackie Chan.

"I remember going to Kryal Castle as a kid and I remember that it had a dungeon," Allica said.

"I got a friend to take some photos and it looked incredible, so six months later we were shooting.

"There was a little crowdfunding at the start and then we got some private investors. I've been working on it full time ever since."

"Films like this don't often get made in Australia." he said.

The last locally-made film set in the middle ages was The Navigator, shot in New Zealand in 1987.

The Siege's Australian distributor Umbrella Entertainment will organise a film premiere in Melbourne.

The filmmakers have also contacted the Moorabool Shire Council for permission to screen the final product at Kryal Castle.

Allica said DVDs would be sold at JB HiFi and Sanity later in the year.

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