Greg KInnear, left, plays a meek salesman who befriends a burned-out assassin in the comedy The Matador, available today on DVD.

Midway through The Matador, Greg Kinnear peers into Pierce Brosnan's lined, moustachioed face and guffaws: "What are you? A spy?"

Brosnan's mangy, self-loathing character, Julian, isn't -- he's a "facilitator of fatalities," i.e.: a hitman.

But it's impossible not to read into the exchange, given Brosnan's history with suave superspy James Bond, a role the actor has said he was fired from. (Depending on who you believe, he either became too expensive or too old for the producers.)

So with Julian, Brosnan's performance can be seen as a salty riff on 007, sending up Ian Fleming's secret agent as a decrepit burnout.

In one scene, he parades through a hotel lobby wearing nothing but a black Speedo and cowboy boots. In another, he paints his toenails. And there is, of course, the moustache-- a form of facial hair that hasn't been in style since about the same time he was on TV playing Remington Steele. The danger, of course, is that all this of this devolves into camp -- with the actors winking at the camera, nudging for laughs. But The Matador doesn't just deliver Brosnan's most entertaining work to date -- it's also his most accomplished.

Although the baggage Brosnan carries is undeniable, he nevertheless manages to make Julian a rounded, dimensional character -- something no actor has ever done with Bond.

Providing more than able support are Kinnear and Hope Davis, two fine actors who embellish the proceedings with a much-needed sense of gravity and humanity.

In the film, written and directed by Richard Shepard, Kinnear is Danny, a meek Denver salesman who, while on a business trip in Mexico, strikes up a conversation -- then a friendship -- with Brosnan's Julian. The dynamics of their relationship are predictable enough -- in Julian, Danny sees a take-charge man of action with an exciting, dangerous life; in Danny, Julian observes a stability he longs for. It's these character chords which make The Matador more than just a wonky farce, while the delirious performances -- and Shepard's sure-footed direction -- keep the story from veering into Quentin Tarantino territory. Instead, the film emerges as a fable as tender as it is darkly comic.

EXTRAS: A making-of featurette and two commentaries -- one from Shepard, as well as one where he's joined by Brosnan and Kinnear.

THE MATADOR

STARS: Pierce Brosnan, Hope Davis and Greg Kinnear

DIRECTED BY: Richard Shepard

IN BRIEF: An assassin and a salesman meet in a bar in Mexico and become friends.

RATING: 4 out of 5