 International film co-production was very common in the 50s, 60s and 70s between Italian, Spanish and French production companies, as exemplified by most of the Spaghetti-western and sword and sandal movies being Spanish-Italian coproductions, typically directed by an Italian, played fifty-fifty by Spanish and Italian actors and shot in southern Spain landscapes.Due to the worldwide popularity of Hollywood stars they would be used to guarantee a respectable audience around the world as well as the United States.The relatively low production costs and high box office return of these films often led to direct Hollywood investment to the non-US studios and producers such as Dino DeLaurentis.