Cop Land

The New York Times Elvis Mitchell

Everywhere the camera turns in this tense and volatile drama, it finds enough interest for a truckload of conventional Hollywood fare. Whatever its limitations, Cop Land has talent to burn.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Casting is everything, and the casting of Stallone -- playing way against type -- as the powerless hayseed sheriff in Cop Land is nothing short of inspired.

Chicago Reader Lisa Alspector

The movie's no roller-coaster ride, but there isn't a boring moment either.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Cop Land emerges as a first-rate morality play in the form of an effective, if occasionally unwieldy, crime drama.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Cop Land isn't a perfect piece, but it's sober, wise and adult.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

While this is probably the actor's best turn since Rocky, and he does a credible job that may earn him the opportunity to do more "serious" work in the future, Stallone's performance is outshone on all sides. That's not a knock against him; it's an acknowledgment that the supporting cast is about the best that it can be.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Branching out in a bold new direction, Stallone is quietly devastating. James Mangold has directed Cop Land from his own ardent, audacious script, and despite some draggy, overdeliberate moments, it's the strongest piece of material to come Stallone's way since he invented himself as Rocky 21 years ago.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

A good film prevented from being a great film by an act of well-intentioned but misguided casting.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

James Mangold follows up the promise of his excellent "Heavy" with this smartly written, superbly acted melodrama.

Variety Todd McCarthy

The increasingly broad strokes with which the story is painted serve to simplify rather than deepen it, and to make it seem more artificially constructed than need be.

Slate David Edelstein

It's formulaic, but it sticks to a classic Western formula instead of a cartoonish blockbuster one.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Dense, meandering, ambitious yet jarringly pulpy, this tale of big-city corruption in small-town America has competence without mood or power -- a design but not a vision.

Empire Ian Freer

An honourable attempt to return the mainstream thriller to a more serious, intelligent vein, yet ultimately lacks the complexity of characterisation, dense subterfuge and overall feeling of weightiness that separates the great from the good.

TV Guide Sandra Contreras

Writer-director James Mangold has surrounded Stallone with an exceptional ensemble cast, and Sly is smart enough to let the actors do the acting.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

Unfortunately, while Stallone can carry the weight, the movie can't. Too much of it is too busy -- too many undeveloped subplots -- and some of the main plotting feels murky.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The characters are all over the map, there are too many unclear story threads, our sympathies are confused, and there's an unconvincing showdown in which the story's lovingly developed ambiguities are lost.

Newsweek Jack Kroll

Mangold is something of a pseudo-Scorsese, assembling elements of other pictures like "Internal Affairs" and "Bad Lieutenant" into an eclectic mix that lacks its own vital reality.

San Francisco Examiner Barbara Shulgasser

Cop Land presents a fairly involved plot, and Mangold is not equipped to do more than blurt all the information onto the screen and let the nuances settle where they may.

Dallas Observer Peter Rainer

Mangold never ventures beyond the obvious. We're set up with righteous anger against the liberal establishment and then fobbed off with goombah melodramatics. The film should be called Cop Out.

Washington Post Rita Kempley

Although the newly paunchy Stallone is credible as a weak, conflicted small-time sheriff, this suburban "Serpico" is a noble, passionless charade.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

It's a shame when an actor like Sylvester Stallone, who's always at his most appealing when he just hunkers down and lets himself be a big galoot, feels he has to make a bid for respectability.