Film

CopLand (1997)

Director: James Mangold

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

When all your citizens are big city cops, NYPD seeking rest in the New Jersey commuter belt, who will police the police? Out of a mixture of complaisance, natural deference and an inferiority complex as big as his middle-age spread, local sheriff Freddy Heflin (Stallone) has let things slide, turning a blind eye to the dubious activities of detective Ray Donlan (Keitel) and his cohorts. Freddy's jerked out of his lethargy when Internal Affairs send Moe Tilden (De Niro) to investigate the apparent suicide of another cop, Donlan's cousin. Writer/director Mangold's latter-day Western is overloaded with good actors, though the bulk of the drama falls on Stallone's broad shoulders. It's effective casting. Stallone's slow, stunted speech patterns mesh well with Freddy's dim realisation that sometimes integrity isn't enough, that you have to put yourself on the line for what you want. His clumsy, unconsummated relationship with Liz (Sciorra) is especially touching - accompanied by scratchy Springsteen records. The mystery suspense elements, however, grind from implausibility (the set-up), to cliché (the climax), with too much back story in between

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