Following his 1995 brush with death in the form of a motorcycle accident, actor/comedian/writer/director Takeshi Kitano spins this wistful -- if bleak -- tale about a pair of high school buddies and their inevitable slide into adulthood. Bumptious Masaru (Kenichi Kaneko) and his quiet sidekick, Shinji (Masanobu Ando), spend much of their time harassing teachers and shaking down students instead of going to school. At one point they dangle a large anatomically correct doll before the class window of a particularly maligned teacher. One day, one of their favorite marks brings along a more skilled street punk to thwart his tormentors. Their thrashing is so thorough that Masaru drags Shinji to a boxing gym. There they learn the ways of pugilism, but it turns out that only Shinji has a gift for the sport. As Shinji rises in boxing rank, Masaru drifts away from his friend and joins a yakuza gang. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi