Walking Tall is a 1973 American neo-noir biographical vigilante action film based on the life of Buford Pusser, a professional wrestler-turned-lawman in McNairy County, Tennessee, played by Joe Don Baker. The film was directed by Phil Karlson. It has become a cult film with two direct sequels of its own, a TV movie, a brief TV series and a remake that had its own two sequels.

Stephen Downing is an American screenwriter, producer, activist, and investigative journalist who began his screenwriting career in the 1960s while still working as a Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officer. Most of Downing's pre-1980 writing and producing credits appeared under pseudonyms to escape notice of the LAPD. Downing is active in the movement to end the international war on drugs and the militarization of police in America. In 2011, Downing became a board member of Law Enforcement Action Partnership, formerly known as Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), after years representing the group as a speaker. He left the board in 2019, but is still an advisory board member who gives speeches and writes op-ed pieces on behalf of the group. He also volunteers his time as an investigative journalist, with a focus on police corruption and reform, for a local print newspaper in Long Beach, California. As a television producer and screenwriter he is best known for the series Walking Tall, RoboCop: The Series, T. J. Hooker and MacGyver.