The PSOE asks the Junta to declare the Sad Hill Cemetery BIC

They demand that the regional administration "take a step forward in the protection and promotion of this place"

[Sad Hill Cemetery built in the municipal limits of Contreras and Santo Domingo de Silos (Burgos), for the filming of the final scene of the film 'The Good, the Bad and the Ugly' in 1966.]

El Correo de Burgos | El Mundo

5/30/2025 

Sad Hill Cemetery

The socialist prosecutors for Burgos registered a non-legislative proposal (PNL) where they urge the Junta de Castilla y León to initiate the necessary procedures for the declaration of the Sad Hill Cemetery, in Santo Domingo de Silos (Burgos), as an Asset of Cultural Interest (BIC), in the category of Historic Site or Cultural Place, in view of its cinematographic, heritage, social and tourist value.

The Sad Hill Cemetery, located in the Mirandilla Valley, "is one of the most recognizable and unique film settings in our country, as well as an example of recovery of cultural heritage through citizen participation and the Carlo Semi Cultural Association," explained Attorney Virginia Jiménez.

This open-air scenery appears in films such as 'The Good, the Bad and the Ugly', directed by Sergio Leone and starring Clint Eastwood, Eli Wallach and Lee Van Cleef, Sad Hill hosted one of the most recognizable scenes in world cinema, with the masterful music of Ennio Morricone.

After decades of neglect, in 2015 a group of citizens and film buffs founded the Carlo SIMI Cultural Association with the aim of restoring and recovering this space, promoting unearthing, cleaning, reconstruction and signage work, in collaboration with local entities, volunteers and through crowdfunding campaigns. The result has been the faithful recovery of the site, with more than 5,000 symbolic tombs placed concentrically on their original cobblestones.

Finally, Jiménez asked the Board "to take a step forward in the protection and promotion of this place. The Sad Hill Cemetery more than meets several of the criteria of Law 12/2002 on Cultural Heritage: its historical and cultural value derived from cinema, its uniqueness as a recovered set, its current use as an open-air cultural space and its impact on local development".