For a man obsessed with The King -- heck he even married his daughter -- it makes sense that Nicholas Cage has finally entered the fat Elvis act III of his career. I just don't hope we read about him flat-lining on the commode, face down in a bucket of lasagna while filming "Ghost Rider 3."

You have to admire the Oscar winner for not caring what anyone thinks. Even Joe Biden is making fun of his spray-painted mullet. And like the "National Treasure" twins and "Ghost Rider," "Bangkok Dangerous" is merely a mediocre action vehicle for Cage to glare, stare and wince through. Don't get me wrong, Cage glares, stares and winces better than anyone. But even a mere 90 minutes of it is a little much.

"Bangkok Dangerous" is directed by the Pang brothers, who are apparently famous and critically acclaimed on the other side of the globe. The strange thing is that the movie is a remake -- from 1999. And predecessor is also made by the Pang brothers -- sans Cage. This is the big screen equivalent of digging up a barely decomposed '90s teen angst series with some of the same players and the same name. Hello, "90210!"

Thankfully, the plot to "Bangkok Dangerous" is mercifully simple. Cage plays a jet-setting assassin named Joe. He talks about living by four simple rules that have nothing to do with dating his teenage daughters. We actually meet Joe when he's decided to retire after his last gig, a four-person assassination spree in the heart of Thailand. (I refuse to make a Murray Head musical reference.)

But for some reason, the trademark discipline and detachment that have apparently made Joe a successful killer for hire are quickly deteriorating. For one thing, his normal routine upon arriving at jobs is to hire a disposable lackey to run errands for him. He usually kills the unsuspecting hayseed after the job, but he rather fancies his Bangkok errand boy, Kong (Shahkrit Yamnarm), and takes him on as his young grasshopper. On top of that, Joe falls for a sweet deaf and mute clerk at a local drugstore, played by Charlie Yeung.  

I have to commend the Pang brothers for this little nuance; when you're trying to squeeze romance into a 90-minute action flick, deaf and mute definitely help with the pacing.

The inherent problem with "Bangkok Dangerous" is that when you're dealing with a bunch of one-dimensional characters, you need something else to drive the entertainment.

You'd think it would be martial arts here, but it's not. The movie fires more bullets than fists at audiences, and the sparse chase sequences reek of early '90s direct-to-cable duds starring the likes of Michael Pare and Rutger Hauer. I was really hoping for more because Cage put in time at the famous Gracie family dojo, the training ground for many elite mixed martial arts fighters.

By the time we're asked to care whether Joe the assassin follows through on his deadly assignments, or if his curious student and cute new lady friend have caused him to reexamine his ways, we're not invested enough to give a hoot. Joe might as well be the anonymous goon wearing the security guard outfit in the bad guys' industrial lair in the climatic scene. You have to love this. You have this smoky abandoned warehouse filled with random bad dudes who are all about to get their teeth knocked (or shot) in by the Cage Fighter, and for some reason, this one guy has on a security outfit like he's a little better than the others.

Unfortunately, "Bangkok Dangerous" doesn't just get the little things wrong. It gets the big things wrong, too. You're better off staying home and renting "Grosse Point Blank" and "Rush Hour." Or you can wait til the Pang brothers rerelease "Bangkok Dangerous" again in 10 years.

"Bangkok Dangerous" opens nationwide today. It's 99 minutes and rated R.

Mike Ward is a Richmond-based writer and editor. Check him out at www.underdogcopy.com.