In 1980 and 1984, you get horse-riding, rail-splitting, looks-legit-in-cowboy-boots and been in a jillion Western movies, the Californian Ronald Reagan.

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Take China, where government regulations keep most Western movies off the shelves, but rampant piracy means that plenty of consumers own and have seen recent flicks like Spider-Man 2.

FORBES: Superhero Gaming

Before the 1960s, the few rare earths that were needed were gathered from sediment deposits along rivers in India and Brazil (like those prospectors washing for gold with pans in Western movies).

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Western movies, though, were part of his life.

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Wisdom's 50-year-career has seen him acclaimed in Britain and elevated to cult status abroad - he is treated almost as a national hero in, of all places, Albania, where his slapstick films were among the few western movies available during the country's Communist regime.

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Box Office Mojo breaks the films down two way: movies that are similar to True Grit and movies that it classifies as in the Western genre.

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Hong Kong movies, Mr Bordwell submits, must be seen in a different way from western ones.

ECONOMIST: Hong Kong cinema: Thunderclouds and flying tigers | The