'From Paris With Love' (R)(out of four)

John Travolta revisits his smug, bad dude, "don't give a damn" killer ways in "From Paris with Love" -- the same sort of ways that were so memorable in his portrayal of Vincent Vega in Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction."

A balder, meatier Travolta plays Charlie Wax, who could be Vega's older alter ego. Wax is fraught with eccentricities and trigger-happy ways, but they are allowed to slide with the CIA because he's so good at what he does. Here, the operative has been sent to Paris to get to the bottom of a few things including who supplied bad drugs to a high-ranking U.S. official's niece. While there, Wax also stumbles upon a terrorist plot to blow up a U.S. delegation headed to the French embassy.

Caught in the middle of all of this is James Reese (Jonathan Rhys Meyers). By day, he's a bookish nerd and right-hand man to a U.S. ambassador in France, but by night he's trying to work his way up as a bigger player in the CIA.

Reese gets cell phone calls from a "Charlie's Angels"-type of instruction man who tells him what to do. He switches license plates on the back of getaway car, and installs a recording device under a desk in the ambassador's office, but this is just small potatoes.

He wants to graduate to the big time, and the voice on the other end of the phone knows it. Mr. Voice gives him a partner to show him the ropes, and that's Wax.

Director Pierre Morel ("Taken") goes for broke in "From Paris with Love." For anyone who loves modern shoot-'em-ups, they'll be in adrenaline heaven. Two particular scenes with super large body counts include smooth CIA man Wax who has figured out that a cheeky Chinese restaurant is hiding more than Egg Foo Young in its kitchen, and its ceiling. There's also a bad guy chase through a mannequin shop where Morel decides to give Travolta the stage in a slo-mo, full- on, double-guns blazing moment.

There's also plenty of heavy artillery, including a highway chase and an Audi driver who not only is hell-bent on getting Wax to his destination on time, but has more than just junk in the trunk -- he's packing a bazooka.

There are twists and turns along the way, including a series of events that turns Reese into a target, effectively allowing the script to show that Wax isn't just a gun-slinger, but has taken advanced courses in intelligence, too.

There's no doubt that the film will put Wax at the head of the espionage pack and in the same on-screen school as Jason Bourne and Ethan Hunt, and Morel would be missing a chance if he didn't squeeze a sequel out of "Paris."

The film shows that the French director seems to know his way around Paris. Yet since Wax virtually destroyed the City of Lights in this film, he may have to send him somewhere else. London calling?