Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

The movie is surprisingly subdued in its pacing, its characterizations, and its go-for-broke sensibilities.

It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Kings of the Sun is directed by J. Lee Thompson and co-written by Elliott Arnold and James R. Webb. It stars Yul Brynner, George Chakiris and Shirley Anne Field. A Panavision production with colour by DeLuxe, it is filmed on location in Mexico at Mazatlan and Chichen Itza. Photography is by Joseph Macdonald and the music scored by Elmer Bernstein.When the Mayan tribe are attacked by Hunac Ceel's (Leo Gordon) army, the King is killed and his son Balam (Chakiris) succeeds the throne. Balam leads his people to new land in the American Gulf Coast region, where they set up a new home from which to flourish again. However, the region is already occupied by an Indian tribe led by Black Eagle (Brynner), can it be possible for two different cultures to co-exist? They need to work it out one way or another because Hunac Ceel and his army are on their way to finish the Mayan's off for good.As with many other historical epics, Kings of the Sun is no history lesson. But for those who don't mind a dialogue driven narrative that's dressed up splendidly in colour and scenery? Then this should more than cater for your needs. The problems with the film are evident quite early in the piece, non native actors playing different race characters is always a bit iffy, but when they are the centre piece of the story it's never going to go away during the film watching experience. Thankfully Brynner is an exception, he manfully carries the film on his considerable frame and offsets considerably the badly cast Chakiris and the pasty faced (and blue eyed!) Field. The latter of which isn't acting badly, she just looks hopelessly out of place. Brynner is panther like in movements, and able to exude the raw emotion required for the role of Black Eagle.Other strong points in the film are Bernstein's score, which lands in the ears and rattles the brain with historical thunder, Macdonald's "Panavision" photography around the exotic Mexico locations, and the battle sequence for the big finale. J. Lee Thompson was a fine director of action, and so he proves here with a near 8 minute construction of gutsy sword and arrow play that features reams of extras and high quality stunt work. If it's a battle sequence to win around those who have been bored by the long stretches of chatter and love triangle dalliances? That can't be guaranteed, but it is a blood and thunder battle fit to be mentioned with the best the historical epic genre has to offer.Thompson (Ice-Cold In Alex/The Guns of Navarone/Cape Fear) copped some flak from the critics for this film, but really the fault lies with the casting director and the writers. You would think that since they were re-jigging history anyway, they may as well have written in some exciting machismo fuelled passages of play long before that final battle, they did after all have the right director for such moments. Still, I liked it quite a bit, yes it's very talky, but there is good interest value in the two different races trying to co-exist, with the big cloud of human sacrifice proving to be the hot topic central to the human interest story that drives the picture on. 7/10

I did not see this film when it was originally released. I was 12 then, but for some reason I was not attracted to it. So today, when I have finally seen it, I am not moved by nostalgia, as it often happens to me when I revisit films from my youth. This one is truly a poor motion picture, for all the reasons some reviewers have indicated: awful script and dialogs, inaccuracy of several sorts, corny costumes and settings, unbelievable hair styles, Caucasian actors playing natives of the American continent, and very bad acting, especially from Yul Brynner who overdid the macho number he created for the King of Siam, posing as if he were doing a photo shoot for "Tomorrow's Man" or any other male physique magazine of the 1960s… Today it seems worse, with everybody speaking the same language (English), but with different USA accents, except Shirley Anne Field who did her best British phrasing. As for the score, once Elmer Bernstein complained in a letter he wrote me (he is the only composer I have ever exchanged correspondence with) that he had not convinced any record company to issue "Kings of the Sun", one of his favorite film scores. If heard apart from the visuals, I am sure it works, but to most ears quite probably it sounds as the score for a western or biblical film. As it is, it sounds strange adding musical comments to images that pretend to convey life in America the continent, before the arrival of the European conquistadors… Bernstein was not all that wrong, in any case, for scriptwriter James R. Webb worked on this one just after "How the West Was Won" and before "Cheyenne Autumn", maybe taking it for another western without horses.

I haven't seen the trailer for this movie, but I'm sure the words "Cast of Thousands" must have splashed across the screen in giant red letters."Kings of the Sun" is a costume melodrama with all the declaiming, strutting around, and general overacting characteristic of all the other costume melodramas produced in the late fifties and early sixties. The setting in pre-Columbian America doesn't really do all that much to distinguish it from the biblical epics filmed in the same period, and Yul Brynner's portrayal of an Indian chief is pretty much the same as his portrayal of an Egyptian pharaoh.Neither George Chakiris as the Maya king nor love interest Shirley Ann Field bear any resemblance at all to Mayans, of course, but nobody in 1963 would have expected they would. As a matter of fact, Chakiris's hairdo was sufficiently reminiscent of Frankie Avalon's to distract me the whole way through. Still, there's a nice score by the great Elmer Bernstein.Those who enjoy the genre will probably find some satisfaction in "Kings of the Sun," but certainly would be much happier with "The Ten Commandments" or "Spartacus."

Rarely rate any movie under 5 stars but this one earned its own. The enthusiasm of some reviewers is understandable, particularly in regards to the conviction from Yul Brynner and the miscast beauty of Shirley Anne Field.British director J. Lee Thompson, rarely more than a journeyman, failed to show any enthusiasm and scriptwriter (Elliott Arnold) was totally at sea in conveying a sense of authenticity in regards to culture: saw this movie only once 40+ years ago but my now wife and I still recall and occasionally quote to each other with great amusement one peculiar bit of dialogue. Balam (the George Chakiris character) reproaches Ixchel (Field) over her attraction to Bald Eagle (Brynner) - this is our recollection: IXCHEL: "Why'd you send for me?" BALAM (in a fit of jealousy): "Before, when he sent for you, you went to him willingly, and NOW I KNOW: it was not for the FIRST time!" His line, not only poorly delivered but compounded by the contrast between Field's British inflection and Chakiris' American accent - the exchange merits inclusion in some anthology.