When a simple, jovial New York firefighter is badly injured rushing into a fire while off-duty, his kid brother takes up his cause with the mayor after he's refused workers' compensation. Somehow that leads to a series of graffiti-based public black eyes for the administration that quickly escalate in size and media coverage. Naturally Jimmy, the barely-legal brother, is behind it all. A close follow-up to director Bob Clark's A Christmas Story, the two are, oddly, very similar in tone and candor. The whimsical, light touch works for a family holiday tale, but in a streetwise take on corrupt politicians it doesn't really fit. A stiflingly straightforward plot, one-dimensional characters and senseless love story don't help matters. This wants to seem charming, funny and intelligent, but in practice it's bland, soft and out of touch. The one real hook could've been a focus on how, exactly, Jimmy manages to constantly thwart the mayor's security measures and lay his tags, but most of that activity is left to our imagination. Weak, flavorless and bereft of passion, it's a real dud.
Review of Turk 182
