Mjeteconer Just perfect...

Connianatu How wonderful it is to see this fine actress carry a film and carry it so beautifully.

Leoni Haney Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

adrian-43767 I will always look back on CHUKA as a B movie with a stellar cast, including Oscar winners Borgnine and Mills. The latter, and lead Taylor (not to mention beautiful Paluzzi) were not known doing Westerns, and all look rather uncomfortable, even if Taylor looks physically fit and does his best to make the most of a not particularly desirable role.Direction is unimaginative and unable to extract anything close to the best from the cast. One of the highlights of the movie, the fight between Borgnine and Taylor, is unconvincing, with poor stunts. The script is limited, and predictable in its attempts to shock the viewer with revelations about the characters' dark sides. I kept thinking that I was watching a British production with Indians for color and atmosphere which, surely, was not what Director Douglas intended. Photography is in keeping with the low budget and the ultimate pointlessness of the entire project.

Garranlahan This may be one of the strangest A-List movies ever made. It has a superb international cast (U.S., Great Britain, Australia, Italy), but the story is unbearably childish, intolerably boring, and riddled with errors and plot missteps that defy belief. Just a very few: no cashiered foreign officer could possibly get a commission in the U.S. Army, much less rise to the rank of Colonel; no Colonel wears major's leaves as his rank insignia; no Colonel ever commanded a fort consisting of what appears to be no more than a squad of soldiers (not to mention that no frontier fort was ever held by a mere squad); no Americans served in the British Army's Sudan Campaign; Chuka NEVER misses his shots at the rapidly moving Indians, regardless the range and the fact that, rather than aiming, he lunges, throws out, his pistol when firing, which absolutely GUARANTEES a miss; poor Louis Hayward (at the end of his career) agrees to lead a mutiny, which no officer in the U.S. Armed Forces has ever done; there was no concept, ever, of a fort to which were banished incompetent, criminal officers and cast-off, second-rate men (where do they GET ideas like that?)---this could go on forever. Given the idiocies of the plot and parade of one moronic scene after another (e.g., the Commanding Officer going around the dinner table and grievously insulting every single officer in his command), it must be admitted that the highly professional cast did its very best with the hopeless script (written by someone with no knowledge of the military or the American West)---but that was like trying to breathe life into the first 500 pages of the Manhattan telephone directory. Years from now this film---given its stellar cast---will be pondered upon as one of the great mysteries in Hollywood production and film-making.

Marlburian Chuka is an unusual and unsatisfying Western with a plot that several times reminds one of Beau Geste. It starts with the US Cavalry retrieving their comrades' bodies at a fort that has been overwhelmed by Indians and then flashes back to portray the events that led up to the massacre.John Mills usually plays a sympathetic character but as Colonel Valois he has no redeeming feature at all, even at the end he stands apparently helpless as his ragtag soldiers fight off the Indian attack. (One wonders why a colonel has such a small command, which seems to total barely 40 men, and the fort itself is small enough to fit conveniently into a studio.) It is hard to find much to like about most of the cast, but then the members are playing unlikeable people. Rod Taylor as the gunslinger Chaka shows his good side in the opening scenes when he offers his food to starving Indians but drives a hard bargain when his scouting expertise is needed. Louis Hayward, looking a bit like the British character actor Terry-Thomas, pays for the services of an Indian girl. Only Ernest Borgnine, appearing larger than one usually visualises him, makes much of a screen impact, and his character is one of the few who seems not to have an unfortunate past.The two Mexican ladies marooned at the post after rashly travelling across country in a stagecoach are an intrusion into the plot (but then I often groan at the contrived introduction of glamorous women into an environment that in real life would be all-male).All in all, a disappointing oddity.

Richard Green Just recently I found a video store in New Haven County where fine old westerns can be had on VHS. One of the ones I had long wanted to see was "CHUKA" or Chuka: the Gunfighter, from 1967.The video transfer was high quality and so watching this movie on tape was an enjoyable experience. Luciana Paluzzi is stunningly beautiful.Indeed, Chuka is something of a Hollywood fantasy but the tone and the settings of the story are fairly well done.Both Paluzzi and her niece, played by Victoria Vetri ( as Angela Dorian ), do very well in this western oddity. Ernest Borgnine is good as ever, at being Ernest Borgnine. Rod Taylor was also very good and very believable as the cowpuncher turned hardened hired killer.The most interesting part of the story was about how Fort Clendennon became a dumping ground for misfits, rejects, and bad officers. This is a well-known but seldom portrayed part of the truth of how the U.S. Army operated in the late 1870's. It is true that in this fiction, many of the soldiers and civilians seem to be just a little too clean for that day and age, but it doesn't really detract from the rapid pace of the events in this drama.Additionally, the extreme deprivation imposed on the Arapaho tribal nation by the Army at this time is another important element. The "injuns" are rather cartoonish in their depictions but at least some aspects of their true grievances are relayed in the plot.Perhaps this Chuka -- pronounced Chuck-Uh -- is a lot more savvy than circumstances in that day and age might have permitted, but Rod Taylor does really well at being fast-as-lightning and very tough.This film gets a vote of 7 from me, which was really a six with a kicker for the beautiful Vetri and the beautiful Paluzzi.Many of the better westerns have been good about presenting the Mexican culture of that time in a favorable light, and this is one of them, and neither Vetri nor Paluzzi appear as simply being "eye candy" for a rough-and-tumble western. The dinner sequence where Colonel Valois rakes his officers over the coals and embarrasses them all is a piece-de-resistance in western drama. Other elements are not so convincing but this is fun way to see a good western drama from a by-gone era of movie making.Chuka derives its power from the high quality of the story on which it is based. I can recommend it heartily for western fans, for Victoria Vetri fans, and for Rod Taylor's excellent, dynamic performance.