First off, a quick apology for not reviewing the Trinity films in order. A mix up at the local Video Kingdom had the rental tapes in the wrong boxes. They Call Me Trinity was in the Trinity is Still My Name box and vice-a-versa. So sorry everybody, but it’s not my fault. And for the record, this one came first.

Gathering up the wounded bounty, they leave, and on the way out, without even turning around or looking back, Trinity (Terence Hill) draws his pistol and shoots back into the cabin -- killing both the bounty hunters, who were trying to shoot him in the back. I guess that reputation is pretty well-earned. He places the wounded man on the liter behind his horse and heads into the nearest town. Upon arrival, they find three men demanding that the sheriff release their buddy out of jail. When the sheriff refuses, they call him out. The sheriff (Bud Spencer) puts down his newspaper and Trinity recognizes him. Spurring on his horse, he rides down the middle of the street, right in between the antagonists. The sheriff recognizes him, too, but doesn’t appear to be happy to see him, and then turns his attention back to the three hooligans. Trinity tells the wounded man that all three "Will be stiff before they can even draw." He’s right. The sheriff quickly guns them all down in the blink of an eye. When the Mexican asks the sheriff's name, Trinity says it's his brother, Bambino -- "The left hand of the Devil."

Trinity takes his bounty into the sheriff’s office, and after a little impromptu surgery, they toss the Mexican into a cell with a full pardon stuffed in his pocket -- he was thrown in there to sleep off all the whiskey he drank during the surgery. These two are brothers, but there is no love lost between them. Wanting to know how Bambino became a sheriff, his older brother says he took a sheriff's badge off a man who was following him after he broke out of prison. The man was the new sheriff of -- wherever they are, and he wasn’t after Bambino, they were just going the same way. After shooting the man in the leg, Bambino stole his horse, his badge, and took his place. Now, he's biding his time until his old gang -- Timmy and Weasel -- show up to pull off a scheme he's concocted.

Meanwhile, Trinity wasn’t the only witness to the earlier gunfight. Major Harrison (Farley Granger) was very disappointed that the sheriff survived. Harrison is butting heads with the new sheriff because he's trying to run off a group of sodbusters so he can take their valley for his horses. Bambino doesn’t care about the farmers. He just wants to get his hands on the Major’s unbranded horses before he gets them into the protected valley -- the aforementioned scheme. So the sheriff sides with the farmers, but for his own reasons. Trinity asks why don’t the farmers fight back. Bambino says they can’t fight because it’s against their religious principles -- they abhor violence and won’t allow themselves to bear arms. Things are starting to get a little hairy, and Bambino needs help keeping the peace and convinces Trinity to be his new deputy.

His new star barely pinned on, Trinity falls in love with a couple of beautiful farmer’s daughters and beats up a few of the Major’s goons in retaliation for not letting the fair maidens use the general store. He then confronts the Major personally, and wounds two more of his men. That evening, after Bambino has gone to bed, Trinity tries to pick another fight with the Major’s men after they say something bad about his mother. (They call her an old son of a so and so.) Old Jonathan (think Walter Brennan) wakes Bambino up because Trinity is going to need some help. Joining his little brother in the bar, Trinity tells him what they said about their mother. And even though what they said is true about dear old mom, the family honor must be upheld. Deciding to settle this like men, with their fists, when the brawl starts, the two brothers wipe the floor with the goons -- well, Trinity mostly watches while Bambino does all the hard work.

A reoccurring theme in all their films. Hill usually starts these brawls, but it was always Spencer who finishes them.

The fight quickly finished, the two share a drink. Trinity thinks it’s a shame what they said about momma. Bambino comments "But it’s true" to which Trinity replies, "Yeah, but she ain’t that old."

The next day, they ride out to the farmer’s camp and Brother Tobias (Dan Sturkie) invites them to stay for dinner. The two girls we met earlier give them the appropriate headgear for the meal, and after they say grace, the camp is raided by Mezcal (Rema Capitani) -- a Mexican bandito, and his gang. He’s raided these homesteads before and enjoys lining the peaceful farmers up and slapping them around for awhile. This time, however, there are a couple of atheists in the deck. Knocking the first two over with ease, the third -- Bambino, is smacked twice with no effect. As Mezcal winds up for a third, he gets a patented Bambino gong on the head. Flattened, the other banditos gather up their wounded jefé and vacate.

Trinity rides out to the farmer’s camp and finds the two girls bathing in the creek. Torn, they tell him their Mormons, so they can both be his wife. Trinity likes this idea so much, he decides to become a farmer on the spot. But he still has to deal with the Major. Arguing with Tobias, saying they must fight, but the elder says they’ll just put their faith in the Almighty. Trinity realizes he needs help when two riders approach the camp. Recognizing Timmy and Weasel (Luciano Ross & Enzio Marano), and telling them Bambino is waiting for them, the two say they were delayed when the ran into a gimpy sheriff, looking for the man who stole his badge. They recognized who he was looking for, then shot him in the good leg, stole his horse, and broke his crutches. Taking them to see Bambino, Trinity asks their help to defeat the Major. Bambino refuses until Trinity says if he helps, he’ll get married and settle down. Which means the possibility of them crossing paths in the future would be less likely. Which would mean Trinity would stop messing up his plans...Bambino agrees.

Meanwhile, Major Harrison and Mezcal have formed an alliance. If Mezcal will drive the farmers out of the valley, Harrison will give the bandit 20 horses. Mezcal agrees, but only if the Major will allow them to steal the horses. (Receiving them would be undignified and an insult.) Harrison orders his men to allow the banditos to steal the horses. In the meantime, Mezcal sends a man to spy on the farmers. At the farmers camp, since they won’t use guns and will only fight in the case of self-defense, Trinity, Bambino and the others do their best to train the farmers on how to fight. Judging by their fighting technique, they'll probably cause as much -- if not more damage to themselves as the banditos ever could. Bambino spots the spy and sends Weasel out to bring him in alive. Upon questioning the prisoner they discover the Major’s plan. So disguising themselves as Mezcal’s men, they steal all of the Major’s horses for themselves. This in turn, brings Mezcal, the Major and all their men to the farmer’s camp, but Bambino has a plan:

The four men hide in a wagon before the bad guys show up. When the Major orders them to destroy the farmstead he wanders too close to the wagon. Bambino secretly sticks a shotgun to his back and quietly orders the Major to tell his men to respect the farmers principles and drop all their weapons. The men think it’s a mighty peculiar order, but comply. And then Bambino springs the trap. The Major promises them that this isn’t over. Trinity disagrees, saying it will end here and takes off his gun belt. Bambino follows his lead and the two start to size up the competition. As Brother Tobias starts to read from the scriptures to keep the peace, he reads the Psalm about a time to reap and sow, and then comes upon the verse that says there is a time to fight. Now, with the Almighty's permission, this triggers an all out brawl as the farmers join the fracas. And the fight goes on for a good ten minutes: The farmers didn’t quite get all the fighting techniques down, but manage to get the job done. Mezcal keeps breaking larger and larger furniture on Bambino with no effect. Even Trinity pitches in for the entire fight. The good guys eventually win the day and the Major is banished to Nebraska...HEY!

Trinity manages to catch up with Bambino, but he won’t let him come to California with them. If he’s going west, Trinity had better go east -- or else. Taking his boots off, he prepares to take his customary spot on his mobile bed, when a wagon and rider approach -- a rider with a very visible set of crutches. The real sheriff asks if he’s seen the three men on his wanted posters. Trinity claims they just robbed him and points off in the direction that Bambino just went. After the sheriff takes off, Trinity stretches out on his stretcher and tells his horse to head for California and they slowly ride off after them...

The End

Like all booming film genres, the Spaghetti Western was destined to eventually go bust. By the 1970s, it was losing steam at the box-office and had all but run it’s course until Enzo Barboni teamed-up Bud Spencer and Terence Hill for a couple of slapstick western-comedies. Serving as a cameraman for several, more traditional Italian oaters, Barboni saw the comedic potential to be wrung from these over-the-top actioneers, and the end results broke all kinds of box-office records in Italy. These comedies translated very well into English, and the rest is cinema history.

They Call Me Trinity, I feel, is the better of the two Trinity movies. It has more action, more laughs and more fights. But my favorite parts are two small bits that might even be just throwaway ad-libs: About halfway through, when Trinity tries to pick a fight in the saloon, old Jonathan goes to wake up Bambino. When he says his brother ran into trouble with the Major’s men, Bambino brightens up for a second -- and actually smiles! -- and asks, hopefully, "Did they kill him?" and is severely disappointed when Jonathan says "No." (A lot of this relies on Spencer’s facial expressions which are hilarious.) Second, is during the grand slam brawl at the end. Among the confusion, Trinity accidentally punches Bambino. Realizing his error, he scrunches up and asks for forgiveness, and then slinks away. Again, these guys have a gift for physical comedy. Hill is at his impish best stirring up trouble and romancing the women, and Spencer can do more with a grunt and a slow burn than most comics I’ve seen. I like how whenever the townsfolk would give a friendly "Hello" to their new sheriff, the burly Bambino would reply with quick, "Shut-up!" 

Really, the entire film is nothing but strung together comic vignettes. Each successive one more wilder than the other until the big brawl at the end. (The strange thing is, each one could stand on their own as short little films. Weird.) Both brothers are so filthy, that I swear you can see tufts of dirt rise off of them when they walk around. When Harrison gives a speech about the noble horse to the hired guns, his men roll their eyes because they’ve heard this boring speech before. After the brawl is ended, the Mormons quickly start helping the banditos whose heads they just kicked in.

And at some point, you slowly realize that hardly anybody gets killed in these movies. Trinity kills the two bounty hunters at the beginning -- I think. And Bambino definitely kills the three hooligans, but after that, these guys shoot to wound (and I don’t think anybody gets killed in the sequel Trinity is Still My Name.) They’ve both been established as being so lethal with the gun, that maybe the brothers feel they have an unfair advantage. Maybe that’s why they always have everybody lose their guns, too, and settle things with their fists. They both have a sense of fair play, and even the playing field in their fights by not using them. Even Weasel and Timmy only wound the real sheriff and break his crutches.

The comedy in these films is definitely low brow and isn’t all that complicated. Some people don’t get into that kind of thing but it makes me laugh my ass off if it’s done well -- and here it definitely is. Both films owe more to the Three Stooges than John Ford. And like the Stooges, some people like them -- and some people think they’re just monumentally stupid. So you can kind of use that as a gauge to decide if you really want to see these films or not.

Posted: 02/15/01. Copy and paste at your own legal risk.

Questions? Comments? Shoot me an e-mail. My dubbing policy.

How our Rating System works. Our Philosophy.