Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Binding: DVD
Brand: Paramount
EAN: 0097360609745
Format: Color
Item Dimensions: Array
Label: Paramount
Languages: Array
Manufacturer: Paramount
MPN: PARD060974D
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Paramount
Region Code: 1
Release Date: 2007-11-20
Running Time: 125
Studio: Paramount
Theatrical Release Date: 1973-02-22

Based on true events in the life of Tennessee sheriff Buford Pusser, who "removes" corruption in his county with a four-foot-long wooden club. When the criminals attack his family, Buford shoots a whorehouse manager in the head and runs hillbilly gangsters over with his car.
Weirdly marketed as a right-wing screed upon its initial release in 1973, Walking Tall is really a tragic, shockingly violent post-noir film based on various legends surrounding real-life Southern sheriff Buford Pusser. Joe Don Baker (The Natural) gives a powerful performance as Pusser, who took on determined forces of crime and corruption in his town at great personal expense. Directed with an intentionally crude force by Phil Karlson (Kansas City Confidential), one of the toughest filmmakers of the 1950s, the film's grimness does not let up, but in the end it is more likely to break hearts than turn stomachs. --Tom Keogh

Customer Rating:
Summary: A Worthy Classic
Comment: This movie to me will always be a Classic. Based on a true story how one man can make a difference. The newer version of this appears better because of the updates..However, the newer version just doesn't seem to grab my heartstrings or make me feel the emotion as I did with the original movie. I am glad to have this classic in my home now.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Will that promise of people power come true ?
Comment: I saw it when it came out, in Dunn North Carolina, mind you, in the new cinema complex that had just open in the new shopping mall that had started opening in 1970 (I bought a tie there, the tie of Campbell community college next door, in 1970). I thought it was interesting, fascinating, but maybe slightly extreme. I have not changed my mind. But what is it about? A man coming back to his birth place and his family, along with his wife, their two kids and their dog, a birth place they decide to call home, in Tennessee. I have seen that pattern so often like in "Sometimes they come back" by Stephen King. He is at once, on the very second day, face to face with the perversion prohibition can produce. The county, or at least the city, is anti-alcohol, anti-prostitution, anti-gambling, and what had to happen happens. Just beyond the county limits a bar cum bordello cum gambling hall opens and attracts the males of the county who want to be ripped of their money by cheating game masters, of their soberness by moonshine whisky unduly called Daniels and of their kinky dreams by trailer female visitors, go and have a good time. But this business is of course in the hands of hard traffickers, of some organized crime at least at the level of the whole state and anyone who opposes it is dead meat, but after it has been severely tenderized. Our hero decides to run as sheriff against the rotten one who is in place and the rotten racist local judge who is covering the whole business. And then it is the story of how he will learn how to do things, how to integrate a black man in his team, how to inspire courage and fight corruption, how to bust the façade of these traffickers, bust the heads of a couple as soon as they draw a weapon, and finally inspire the people to build a posse and go out for the Lucky Spot of their dreams and burn it down. True of course, but too extreme. Things never happen that way. It takes time, a lot of time, to move public opinion, particularly in a small town. It takes time and finesse to trick and trap mafia criminals. It takes time and patience to trick and trip a judge who has so much power in his hands. But in 1973 it was a sign on the road away from the good old silent majority. The very first step on a very long way that is just coming ripe right now, maybe, and the silent majority might finally get some voice and shout "Yes We can" to their desire for "the change they need". Will that be a landslide or a tottering stumble? The film seems to believe that such radical change is possible once the fruit is ripe. Yet it does not show the ripening of the fruit, just the plucking.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Walking Tall
Comment: Sorry, been too busy to watch the video. But I did see it when it first came out & it was fantastic. Joe Don Baker did a great job playing Pusser. I should know because I knew Bufor Pusser.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Still no respect
Comment: In the early 70's two lawmen came to national attention, Buford Pusser and Frank Serpico. They both fought corruption and had been shot in the face-(Pusser was shot in the face twice and on another occassion had his jaw shot off and his wife killed) Both men became subjects of the movies. Serpico, a NYPD officer became the subject of a major motion picture vehicle for Al Pacino. Pusser, a Southern sheriff, was the subject of a low-budget drive-in movie exploitation film. The Serpico movie was good but the Pusser movie made headlines and millions. The folks at BCP saw what they had and rereleased the film with a new PR campaing. The public realized that this was a story worth seeing.
Buford Pusser is now a legend and this film is a cultural icon. Unfortunatly the handlers of the movie refuse to see it's significence. Pusser was, according to the movie: "a poor white trash sheriff."
His story, while far greater than Serpico's, did not rate the respect of the coasts movie mogals. But the public did. While the "Serpico" DVD is loaded with extras, even a documentary on the real Frank Serpico, this "Walking Tall" dvd offers nothing but a copy of the film. That's too bad, the movie and Pusser deserve better. Still, this is a great movie. As was "Serpico." Pusser's daughter will release a biography on her father in Oct. of 2008, called "Walking On" hopefully it will help raise his story to the respect that it deserves.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Walking Tall is a must see!!
Comment: "Walking Tall" (the orignal version), starring Joe Don Baker, is one of those movies you watch over & over again! This one has it all. Based on a true person; hard to believe something like this can really happen! This will bring out every emotion ya got! All the actors were indeed perfect for their roles, (which doesn't happen too often!) This movie will keep you glued to the tube from the very beginning, to the end. Matter of fact, I did't want to see it end! The story is based on a man that moves his family back to his small home town. (A move that will change all of their lives forever.) Really, it's got it all: laughter, sadness, surprise, and awe! Truely shocking, but also a MUST SEE!!!

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