Sylvester Stallone: Who 'needs an assault weapon?'

Despite Sylvester Stallone's image -- and despite the fact that his new film is titled Bullet to the Head -- the actor told the Associated Press that he supports increased gun control on Feb. 1.

"Who ... needs an assault weapon? Like really, unless you're carrying out an assault. ... You can't hunt with it. ... Who's going to attack your house, a (expletive) army?" he said.

Yet he added that he believes mental health is also a major issue. "I think the biggest problem, seriously, is not so much guns. It's that every one of these people that have done these things in the past 30 years are friggin' crazy. Really crazy! And that's where we've dropped the ball: mental health," he told the AP.

However, the focus on mental health in regards to gun control has met some controversy. Gun control advocates fear that blaming mental health will end efforts to strengthen background check laws and ban certain types of weapons.

Psychiatrist and director of Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons' Division of Law, Ethics and Psychiatry told the Huffington Post recently, "Most gun violence is just not committed by people with mental illness."

HuffPo also reported that a 2005 study from the Institute of Medicine found that about 5 percent of violent acts in the U.S. are committed by those with mental illness.

In December, the National Rifle Association's Wayne LaPierre said that a national registry of mentally ill individuals could deter gun violence, reported the Washington Post.

[Image: Sylvester Stallone on Shutterstock]