We have to credit the Executive Nabobs at United Artists for their imagination in greenlighting the most far flung ideas for battle spectacles. After their huge Cossack jamboree "Taras Bulba". they next turned their attention to that little chunk of North American history that we all dozed through in Junior High school.......the Mayans.
Off screen narrator James Coburn solemnly informs us that the Mayans, way ahead of the curve in math and calendars, still clung to the idea of ritual stabbings to encourage the Gods to grow their crops. To add insult to injury, the poor Mayan sucker selected for sacrifice had to take that punishing climb straight up the pyramid to meet his appointment with a dagger.......one hell of a workout with little reward at the end.
Soon after that, the whole gang and their glum young king (George Chakiris, still surfing the wave of his "West Side Story" fame), get chased out of Mexico by a rival tribe who've figured out how to make metal swords.
Sailing across the still oil-free Gulf, George and his not-so-merry Mayans set up shop on the coastline, where they immediately end up in a serious real estate "we were here first" dispute with the continent's current residents....Chief Black Eagle (Yul Brynner) and his hordes of Native Americans.
Adding the tension: Yul and George both have the hots for a babe-o-licious Mayan princess (Shirley Anne Field). But before either of them get a chance to take cold showers, along comes the metal-sword bullies......... and it's high time for Mayans and Indians to join forces and punch multiple holes in those marauding jerks with assorted arrows and spears.
All the usual tropes are on display........normally very good actors saddled with stilted mock-gravitas dialogue and even sillier costumes and wigs. Elmer Bernstein's muscular score almost never takes a rest during the entire running time.....(he must have been exhausted after the scoring sessions).
But oh my, that glorious, massive battle......unsullied and untouched by CGI. Real crowds of stuntmen carving the crap out of each other with fearless abandon. Woo hooo.....
As for the actors, only the powerfully exotic Brynner feels truly at home here.....the rest of them stand around and talk like Disney animatronic figures. Brynner, like John Wayne, Sean Connery and Steve McQueen, mastered physical movement for the camera.......he glides through this movie like a restless panther and he's the only one you look at when he's center stage.
For Yul and the battles, we'll spear 3 stars (***).....and as someone battling winter weight we bet a few trips up and down that pyramid would knock some pounds off.....as long as there was no High Priest up there waiting to knock us off.......
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