Colombian-born Spanish actor Juan Pablo Raba vamps, flashes his teeth, sings a bit and wears the icecream-colored suit of a Central American dictator with panache in “Freelance,” a very dumb John Cena action comedy that Raba pretty much steals.

“You must STROKE the head you are going to cut off,” he purrs.

New Zealander Marton Csokas shows real commitment by slinging a mean South African accent as a mercenary in the employ of unseen mineral oligarchs out to depose that corrupt but debonair dictator to give them easier access to the natural resources of fictional Palodonia.

The director of “District B-13” is on board, so the effects are first rate, the fights tight and the stunts are pretty good — a few jarring moments when the action is sped up to make fights “believable” excepted.

But “very dumb” barely covers how silly and violent this half-assed Banana Republic riff turns out to be.

Cena plays an ex Special Forces trooper who loses his “purpose” when he has to quit, become a lawyer and support his wife (Alice Eve) and little girl. Then his old comrade in arms (Christian Slater), founder of a “Contracted Defense Initiatives” (mercenary) company offers him a big paycheck for escorting a scandalized reporter looking for a comeback via her college roommate’s friend, President Venegas (Raba).

She will interview this interview-shy tyrant in the land where Mason Pettit’s special ops team was almost wiped out on a years-before mission to assassinate President Venegas. Lawyer Pettit will gear up and ensure Claire Wellington (Brie) survives. But he’s not happy about it, and now he’s newlycseparated from his wife.

Only when they get there, the charming Venegas barely has a chance to sweet-talk arrogant reporter Claire and make assorted “petite” jokes about Pettit when there’s a coup attempt, which Pettit foils with a combination of bravado, muscle memory and blind luck.

Now he’s trying to get this reporter and her “scoop” out of the country, with the smarmy dictator in tow and all sorts of folks wanting them all dead.

“You’ve gotta be alive to have the scoop of a lifetime,” Pettit reasons.

Cena , a funnyman/muscleman, plays this guy as physically as well as emotionally vulnerable. Old injuries have him moaning and groaning. He’s conflicted about saving the dictator and rattled by the way the reporter’s attentions turn from contemptuous to flirtatious.

And he’s trying real hard to impress her — shooting down helicopters and the like. “Pretty cool, huh?”

At times, the script has the guy show off his education to the uppity journalist, most recently reduced to MTV-style “celebrity cribs” stories and the like. Is she desperate enough for a comeback that she’ll sugar coat a tyrant?

“Please read Hannah Arendt,” who coined the phrase “The Banality of Evil,” Pettit blurts at one point, a reference over the heads of the target audience this movie was going for.

It’s as if the screenwriter is trying to convince us or somebody that this isn’t as stupid and childishly violent (gun fetishizing) as we can plainly see it is.

But Raba is a hoot, and even if Csokas isn’t in the bloom of brawling, villainous youth, he gives fair value and he and Brie and Raba and even Cena show commitment to their parts in all this far beyond what this nonsense deserved.

They’re kind of fun to watch even if “Freelance” isn’t.

Rating: R, for violence, nudity and profanity

Cast: John Cena, Allison Brie, Juan Pablo Raba, Christian Slater, Alice Eve and Marton Csokas.

Credits: Directed by Pierre Morel, scripted by Jacob Lentz. A Relativity release.

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