Hey Bill,
what did you use for blood?
I think one of the first to use the cable pulling the shot guy backwards was George Stevens, "killing" Jack Palance in Shane. They were looking for a very brutal way to show the impact of a bullet, and the shots on the soundtrack were also louder than usual.
Wayne managed to use the cable very well, and not even from a front perspective as usual, but from the side, in the final assault on the Alamo, when he gives the Mexican army a canon shot of horsenails, resulting in guys being pulled back.
