Rent They Call Me Trinity / Trinity is Still My Name (1970)

Review for They Call Me Trinity or Lo Chiamavano Trinita - They Call Me Trinity / Trinity is Still My Name review by Strovey

Although Italian actors Mario Girotti and Carlo Pedersoli, who to make them more recognisable and popular in the USA changed their names to Terence Hill and Bud Spencer, had been acting for some time before this comedy ‘spaghetti’ western and had teamed up previously in God Forgives, I Don’t and Ace High, this was the film that elevated them to stratospheric fame, particularly in the English speaking world, and cemented them as a charismatic and fun comedy pairing. An amazing fact really considering someone like me, as a young child when I first saw these comedy westerns, would never hear them with their genuine voices.

I can recall watching this film on Saturday night at home on my own aged around 12 or 11 so about four or three years after the film was made and thinking it was the funniest thing I had seen ever. After this recent viewing my enjoyment whilst still there at watching the antics of the lovable duo was nowhere near as elevated.

I did notice that my snorting and giggling was strongest at the start of the film as we are very quickly shown what type of person Trinity (Hill) is. Tramp-scruffy, so lazy he gets his horse to drag him across the desert and does not even stir as the travois goes through a river. Unassuming and harmless-looking, he has a reputation by name only, which is demonstrated when two rival bounty-hunters try to shoot him in the back. All done with humour and charisma from beginning to end. Indeed, a strong beginning and some skilled filmmaking.

Despite being cynical and old now and confirming some of the film's fun had faded this was still an enjoyable romp through its running time and it has to be said the movie being fifty-three years old does have to be taken into account.

Where writer and director Enzo Barboni hits the nail on the head is with the satire of the whole genre of the film. He is on record as saying he did not like the uber violence of the countless Italian-made Westerns that were cashing in on the Leone’s ‘classics’ in which stoic and seemingly indestructible anti-heroes were only successful if their body count hit triple figures. It has to be said even at this time there appeared to be a Spaghetti Western fatigue setting in so the timing of Trinity was fortuitous.

The trope of a silent, dressed-in-black killer, is destroyed by Hill in one memorable scene and throughout the film he is so deadly with his gun he can shoot someone pointing his gun behind his back without looking. Hard to exaggerate an already exaggerated genre and do it for laughs but it works.

Where the film lags is after we establish Major Harriman is the big bad and will do anything to establish control of the land for his beloved horses. The setup is funny but then the build-up and indeed the final showdown ending just goes on too long, outstays its welcome and somehow makes a slapstick, comedic fight between, standard Mexican bandits, henchmen and ‘shackles-off’ Mormons too long and eventually not funny.

The storyline is bog standard, I mean a group of well-meaning non-violent people are harassed by very violent evil-doers who want them out of the way using their own nefarious means. This is almost as old as boy-meets-girl, so it must stand on its premise and comedic outlook which it definitely did at the time it was in cinemas and still, in a way, does now, even if from a film-history perspective.

Without a doubt, if you enjoy spaghetti westerns like slapstick and silly humour delivered by lovable fools this film will be worth your while seeking out. It is over a century old but at the time was definitely a shot in the arm for what was becoming a tired genre and this does not distract from the fun and entertainment that can be had in a viewing and Hill and Spencer were without doubt a slick and comfortable double-act that worked perfectly.