Sylvester Stallone’s Netflix Doc Is a Superficial Dud

Sylvester Stallone paints himself as a self-made man who created a Hollywood persona rooted in his true character, struggles and spirit in Sly, Thom Zimny’s hagiographic documentary. By letting him tell his own tale, however, this non-fiction affair—debuting on Netflix Nov. 3, following its world premiere at this fall’s Toronto International Film festival—provides only some of his story, its up-close-and-personal view masking as much as it reveals.

“Hell yeah, I have regrets. But that also is what motivates me to overcome the regrets,” says Stallone at the start of Sly. As the ensuing snapshot of the artist conveys, the mistakes that most plague him have to do with prioritizing work over family. Despite much talk about putting his career ahead of his wife and children, though, there’s so little substantial mention of his clan or personal life that the sentiment rings hollow. It’s not that Stallone seems to be lying so much as he wants to grapple with such issues via generalities. By refusing to even say his kids’ or wife’s names on-camera, much less discuss the nature of his relationships with them, he neuters his own purported desire to reckon with the missteps he believes he’s made along his A-list career path.

Superficiality is the name of Sly’s game—a not-uncommon state of affairs for an authorized bio-doc guided by the participation of its subject. Zimny’s film is framed by Stallone’s decision to move out of his Los Angeles mansion and back to New York, where he was born in Hell’s Kitchen to a domineering mom and physically brutal dad. It’s the latter who proves a recurring focal point, since once his parents split, Stallone relocated to Maryland with his father and, by his account, suffered repeated physical and emotional abuse. Stallone makes clear that his old man’s violence and lack of support drove him to court audiences’ acceptance and adoration, as well as to make that a constant theme in his work. Nowhere was that more evident than in Rocky, the Oscar-winning underdog saga that turned the struggling actor-writer into an overnight sensation and forever changed his personal and professional fortunes.

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