"They called him... Campo Imperatore": Bud Spencer and Terence Hill, an Italian western between myth, cinema and Abruzzo silences

Viaggiando Italia

By Rediazone

July 13, 2025

In the folds of the mountains of Abruzzo there is a place where time seems to have stopped. It is called Campo Imperatore and, at over 1800 meters above sea level, it stretches like an ocean of grass between sharp ridges and low clouds. Looking at it closely, it resembles certain valleys of New Mexico or Arizona, but with the smell of genepì and the rocks of the Gran Sasso in the background. That's why, in the 70s, someone decided that this plateau of Italy could be transformed into a perfect set for the Wild West.

Right here, among horses, dust and silences, the imagery of the Trinity saga took shape, the one with Bud Spencer and Terence Hill: two unlikely gunslingers, brothers (more or less), who between fistfights, bean dishes and spaghetti western looks have conquered audiences around the world. In particular, some iconic sequences of "They Call Me Trinity..." (1970) and its sequel, "... they kept calling him Trinity" (1971), were filmed in the area between Campo Imperatore, Rocca Calascio and the Piano di Aremogna. The director Enzo Barboni, aka E.B. Clucher, chose these landscapes for their scenographic roughness and for the clear light that already seemed to be the corrective color of film.

Today, if you walk along the road that leads to the Duca degli Abruzzi refuge or go towards the Albergo di Campo Imperatore (where Mussolini was a prisoner in 1943, another fragment of history that intertwines), you could almost expect to see Terence Hill appear on a white horse, with his mocking smile, or hear Bud Spencer snorting behind him as he slices bread with a cleaver. The area has remained intact, bare, epic. Every now and then a shepherd passes by, or a cyclist who feels like a cowboy of the pedals.

There is no shortage of anecdotes: it seems that the production, during filming, had fallen in love with the beans cooked on site by the Abruzzo people, so much so that they included them as a recurring gag in the films. And that scene, in which Trinity eats directly from the pan with bread, was not improvised, but inspired by a real meal eaten in a stazzo above Castel del Monte.

For those who love cinematic travel, Campo Imperatore is a must-make pilgrimage. More than a place, it is a permanent natural set, where the wind still tells stories of choreographed fistfights and film-worthy sunsets. And if evening falls suddenly, with the sky lighting up orange over the mountains, you realize that no special effects are needed: the epic is already all there, in the absolute silence that still seems to be waiting for a line from Terence Hill or a well-placed punch from Bud Spencer.