I don't want to be a stickler, but John's holding his sabre in the 'coda longa larga e distessa' position, and he can't do anything with that. He'd need to execute a falso dritto from that wind-up which he'd never have time for, 'coz he's cutting backwards.
He should be in Di Testa or di faccia or a hanging guard, or even a St. George if he doesn't want to extend himself, but the hanging guard is the one recommended: he needs to take lessons from Terence Stamp in 'Far from the Madding Crowd'.
Not that I want to give him any hints in massacring the red nations.
"Solid John Ford western - who could have taught Peckinpah a lesson or two when it came to portraying the Old West without resorting to disgusting slow-motion gore - in which all the elements are pleasantly in place, with genuine "humour" and "warmth" from a cast of old-timers who knew what entertainment was... as opposed to the so-called "modern" takes with oh-so-rebellious Bob Dylan songs - as if complaining about how the times were a-changin' actually did anything to help matters 150 years ago."
(Leslie Albert-Hall Stairwell - "Fillums - As I See Them" - Volume 94, 1979)
