Middle Earth Ranger Forum

I found this site and thought it might be helpful for some people, myself included.

http://www.safd.org/

Anthony Delongis had a video called Broadsword for Stage and Screen. It was a pretty quick and simple tutorial on basic choreo.
The basic routine looked very similar to what Boromir is taking the Hobbits through in this clip:

Looks like five cuts, ending with a strike to the head, which is the basic routine that Delongis described.

Of course, Cinco Teros escrima has five strikes too.

Delongis is great. Awesome stage combatant, and an entertaining actor. He had a couple of episodes in Highlander. He's also involved in the Martinez school of Destreza, the Spanish rapier and dagger system. I do have his video.

That being said, stage combat is wrong for learning actual combative techniques. The object of stage combat is to avoid hurting the other person. And that is a valuable skill. I really admire good stage combat. I used to do some at different SF conventions. It's a lot of fun.

But it builds in the wrong set of reflexes. When you train in actual combat, you develop a different set of reflexes, timing and targeting. And it's hard to override those on stage. On stage, you want to wait for your partner to signal that he's ready for you to swing. In combat...not so much.

As for escrima, it's an awesome system for training sword.

Pwyll wrote:That being said, stage combat is wrong for learning actual combative techniques.

With respect, nobody in this thread mentioned anything about actually going to war.

Delongis is spoiled living in LA being able to train with both Dan Inosanto and Toshishiro Obata, both probably as private lessons.

Heh. Fair enough Good point.

Oh, yes, proximity to Guro Inosanto is a great thing. He is awesome to work with. Just amazingly fast.