I saw Cop Land, blah, blah, blah. The movie was good, blah, blah, blah.

Let's talk about the real story.

How about Sly's gut?

Sylvester Stallone, in a move designed to either resurrect his acting career or prepare for winter, binged and purged like a teen-aged prom queen (with an emphasis on the bingeing) and gained 40 pounds.

Sly grew a gut.

Word is, to prepare for his role as the over-the-hill small town sheriff, Stallone snacked on a diet full of carbohydrates and starches. Read between the lines: he ate donuts, lots and lots of donuts. Whoever said he wasn't a method actor? He reportedly became so self-conscious of the weight he was gaining that he would tell women he met on the street that he wasn't really Stallone, but an out-of-shape Stallone Impersonator. He would then proceed to yell "Yo, Adrian!!" in a high squeaky voice to prove that he wasn't Stallone.

But what does the gut look like? Sadly, we never get to truly see. Word is, they had a shot of him sleeping that they cut out because when he rolled over, his gut would slosh over to the side and the crowd would invariably gasp in astonishment. The director felt that the shot took the audience out of the movie, and into a freak show, and he wanted to separate his movie from the rest of Stallone's movies.

Does the gut help Sly's performance? Actually, yes. Sylvester turns out what is possibly his best and easily his most low-key performance in years. The darned guy actually acts. It helps that he's surrounded himself with De Niro, Keitel, Liotta and the rest of the usual mobsters. I swear, these guys play these same bad news mobsters so often it's a wonder they aren't on the FBI's most wanted list. Do they know they're acting, or are they just going about their business while a documentary film crew follows them around?

But I digress. I don't mean to spend so much time on the movie when we're really just here to talk about the Gut.

It's usually covered in a T-shirt, sometimes in a finer white dress shirt. Never exposed to the naked air, so I can't tell you much about the coloring. It's a good Gut, firm yet flaccid. As if this small-town sheriff has spent a long time eating donuts and drinking beer. It adds to the overall character that Stallone was trying to create, that of a total loser. It is soft enough to give a little when Stallone is hit in the Gut, yet buoyant enough to jiggle convincingly when he laughs.

Any part of the movie without his Gut is immaterial.

There is, however, one brilliant scene at the end. I mean it is a great scene. It is the kind of scene that makes you think that the director did this entire movie to film that scene.

Which is a crock because we all know he made it for The Gut.

I give Cop Land 3 1/4 Babylons. Worth seeing but not life-threatening.

There ya go. If you wanna see Goodfellas 2: The Cops, go see this baby. Although to be honest, it's not nearly as bloody as Goodfellas. If you are hoping that this Stallone film is another version of useless violence, stay away. This is not Judge Dredd 2.

This is a much better movie than his usual fare.

At least, that's my Gut reaction.

Editor's Note:

Yes. He did that entire review for that one last punchline. Don't worry, we flogged him.

Okay, maybe not, but I can dream, can't I?

Cop Land
Rated: R
Directed by: James Mangold
Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Harvey Keitel, Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, and Sylvester Stallone's Gut