‘COMIN’ AT YA 3D!’opens in Austin at Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar, Village and Lake Creek on Friday, February 24th

Liz Lopez Rating A
I grew up watching Westerns in South Texas with my family, including my older siblings and my Spanish speaking grandmother who loved family time watching ‘Gunsmoke’ with James Arness as Marshall Matt Dillon and ‘Rawhide’ with Clint Eastwood. It did not matter that she did not understand the language, but the actions, expressions and tone provided by each character garnered her interest and kept her heading back to the television set weekly. She provided her own title in Spanish for each program and everyone in the family knew exactly which program it was she asked for. As I recently viewed ‘COMIN' AT YA! 3D,’ it brought back so many of those childhood memories and I felt entertained despite the simplicity of the script.

‘COMIN’ AT YA 3D!’ returns for its 30th Anniversary as the first fully restored classic 3D film in stunning high-definition utilizing state-of-the-art RealD 3D® technology. After the restoration in 2011, it is being distributed by Drafthouse Films and released exclusively in Texas theaters on February 24th. Actor/Producer/writer/ Tony Anthony and Italian genre film veteran Ferdinando Baldi (director) realized the first-ever 3D spaghetti-western in 1981, armed with exclusively developed, cutting-edge 3D technology. The indie broke box office records and is the first classic 3D film to get a state-of-the-art digital restoration.

Tony Anthony’s original story became the screenplay by Wolf Lowenthal, Lloyd Battista and Gene Quintano (along with Esteban Cuenca Sevilla and Ramón Plana Castell who are uncredited). This tale is about a gang of ruthless bandits who raided towns of the women, who are in effect human traffickers as they enslaved them, then paraded them for sale to the highest bidder. When the two brothers leading the gang kidnapped a newlywed bride, Abilene (Victoria Abril), from her husband’s arms in the church, her husband becomes a vengeful gunslinger determined to rescue his true love. The cast includes H. H. Hart (Tony Anthony), Pike (Gene Quintano), Polk (Ricardo Palacios), Lewis Gordon, Luis Barboo, Charly Bravo, Joaquin Gómez and many, many more cast members that are not credited in the roles of the abducted women, gang members and the patrons who were in the black market of buying women.

This 3D movie gave me the feeling I had the first time I saw a movie at the IMAX Theater in Austin, in that the flying fists, flaming arrows and other things appear as if they are in your face and about to ffel it yourself. It was just plain fun and I felt like a kid enjoying the experience with no one to mock me for the 90 minutes of the film. It was what I enjoyed as a kid, but decades later it was available in 3D, which I missed. It is not too late to catch this fun film now with a restoration that will certainly entertain those of us who still do not mind a little cheesiness in our films from time to time.

The film will be opening in Austin at Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar, Village and Lake Creek on Friday, February 24th.