CARAZA, SPAIN—There are two types of people in the world, Clint Eastwood’s Man With No Name tells a rival gunslinger who has no bullets. Those with a loaded gun, and those who dig. “You dig.”
People dress in period costumes during the reenactment of scenes from Western The Good, The Bad And The Ugly, in Carazo, Burgos province, Spain, September 8,The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
Volunteers in northern Spain have taken his words to heart, painstakingly tending the freshly dug graves on sets featured in Sergio Leone’s classic “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” to make the area a pilgrimage site for movie fans.
Aerial view of refurbished film set Betterville Prison in Carazo, Burgos province, Spain, September 7, 2024. The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
With its rolling hills of heather-strewn shrubland, the countryside near the town of Santo Domingo de Silos, some 200 kilometers north of Madrid in Burgos province, stood in for the American Southwest in the epic set during the US Civil War.
Luciano Maldonado Moreno holds a pistol at Sad Hill cemetery in Santo Domingo de Silos, Burgos province, Spain, September 8, 2024. The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
The 1966 film is a classic of the “spaghetti Western”—a genre referring to movies set in America’s wild West but set in European locations and directed by mostly Italian filmmakers.
The last installment in the “Dollar Trilogy” that propelled actor Eastwood to international stardom is a fixture in most all-time best movie lists.
A sign overlooks Sad Hill cemetery in Santo Domingo de Silos, Burgos province, Spain, September 8, 2024. The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
Pilgrimage place
In 2015, a local cultural association launched a sponsorship drive to reconstruct the fictional Sad Hill Cemetery, site of a famed showdown between Eastwood’s Man with No Name and two rivals for a hoard of buried Confederate gold.
The cemetery now boasts more than 5,000 prop graves.
Women dressed in period costmes carry pistols during the reenactment of scenes from Western The Good, The Bad And The Ugly, in Carazo, Burgos province, Spain, September 8, 2024. The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
Kristine Guzman of the regional film commission said its refurbishment should sway fans to flock to what “will constitute a new place of pilgrimage.”
Angel Sanchez, 63, from Toledo in central Spain, told Reuters he was weighing whether to have his own ashes scattered there.
To the east of the cemetery lies the Betterville prison camp, where the gunslingers played by Eastwood and Eli Wallach are held after being captured by Union soldiers.
Sad Hill Association founder Sergio Garcia and Kristine Guzman, from the Castilla And Leon Film Comission, stand next to the inaugural plaque of the renovated film set of Betterville Prison in Carazo, Burgos province, Spain, September 8, 2024. The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
Original extras
Betterville was rebuilt using juniper trunks burnt when a fire ravaged the surrounding natural park in 2022. The project received 50,000 euros ($55,000) in funding from the park and involved professional construction crews.
Last Sunday, reenactors marked the project’s completion.
Angel Sanchez, 63, from Toledo, walks through Sad Hill cemetery in Santo Domingo de Silos, Burgos province, Spain, September 8, 2024. The Sad Hill Association, a group of locals and film buffs, have attracted thousands of fans to the area after renovating original sets used in Italian director Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, including Betterville Prison and Sad Hill graveyard, scene of the iconic shootout between protagonists Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Eli Wallach. REUTERS/Vincent West
Garbed in a Union officer’s uniform, Sergio Garcia, a founding member of the Sad Hill Cultural Association, unveiled a plaque commemorating the hundreds of local extras who partook in the original production.
At the cemetery, a man stood in a ready-to-draw pose as his portable speaker blared Ennio Morricone’s “Ecstasy of Gold” earworm from the film’s unforgettable score.
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