Empire is to Scarface as Hogan's Heroes is to Stalag 17, minus the laughtrack.

That is to say, it travels somewhat the same path, but sucks all the menace out of the premise with incongruity, cuteness and -- in this case, largely unintentional -- humour.

Almost everything about this movie about a small-time Puerto Rican druglord is wrong, but let's start with numero uno -- the star. John Leguizamo is a terrific comedian and is quite good in a gangster milieu at playing shrimpy weasels.

Unfortunately, here he's supposed to be the Big Guy -- Vic Rosa, a.k.a. "Empire," the boss of a sizable piece of drug-dealing turf in the Bronx, a major player whose wannabe-white-Manhattanite dreams lead him to become involved with a yuppie investment banker (Peter Sarsgaard).

As such, he's supposed to wield fear and "family" ties to keep his boys in line, and just plain fear against his competitors (including gargantuan rapper Fat Joe as "Tito").

I'll say it again. John Leguizamo. Striking fear into Fat Joe, who has chins that are bigger than him.

Wait, it gets better! Vic and Tito and the other bad boys in the Bronx answer to a vicious female uber-druglord called La Colombiana played by -- wait for it -- Isabella Rossellini! So THAT was the secret ingredient in those Lancome products.

Did I mention this isn't supposed to be a comedy?

It doesn't help that, despite a scene of Vic laying a beating on one of Tito's boys early on, and a later scene where he pulls the trigger execution style, this film dwells on cuddly Vic, the patsy.

Cuddly Vic loves kids, going so far as to buy a Playstation 2(TM) for a junkie-mom's son, and threatening her in case she decides to pawn it for a fix. When his upwardly-mobile girlfriend Carmen (Delilah Cotto) announces she's pregnant, he's prime pickings for Carmen's college classmate Trish (that "Talking Barbie" of an actress, Denise Williams) and her investment banker boyfriend Jack, played by Peter Sarsgaard in a full yuppie scum mode that's practically an offering to the shrine of St. James of Spader.

With every breath, Trish and Jack virtually scream, "We're con artists!" I'm not sure if the script was pre-Enron, but Jack's earnest selling job of sure-fire "offshore investments" to Vic is another of many unintentionally hilarious moments.

Wide-eyed Vic -- that psychologically savvy guy with the survival skills of a jungle cat -- falls for it like a rube from Kansas City, with predictable results.

It all happens to the inappropriate strains of a Latino easy-listening soundtrack (cue the Chick Corea!). This, in a movie featuring Fat Joe and Treach as actors. That's just wrong.

(This film is rated AA)

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