Takashi Miike has taken autobiographical novel of Riichi Nakaba as the basis of this film. Young Thugs has been made into film earlier by Kazuyuki Izutsu (1996). The film and the novel tells about four young friends living a middle of violence and criminality. Riichi, Yuji, Kotetsu and Ryoko rob their teacher in last schoolday, and after that Ryoko (who is Riichis girlfriend) tries to live some normal life by getting a real job. For Riichi, coming of age isn't so easy and when he falls in love with another girl, their tight group's ties begin to crack.

One of the strongest skills of Miike, creating in-depth characters by direction is one of the best sides in this film. There's enough time and room for every character, for viewer to learn and like them - although the black humor is there every now and then. Even the strangest persons have their human sides.

After all this it's really a shame, that in the middle of the film I almost fall asleep. You can find the reason after multiple times of watching : the story isn't as good as you expect after an energetic start. There's no particurarly interesting scenes in the middle part and the film starts to "drag". Though, in the end Miike has few shocking surprises that lift the overall feeling of the film radically.

Before-mentioned quartet is played by Kôji Chihara (Riichi), Seiji Chihara (Yuji), Kyôsuke Yabe (Kotetsu) and Sarina Suzuki (Ryoko), along with two other main characters : Marie Kikuchi as Nahomi and Hiroko Nakajima (Masae). These actors and actresses really have the chemistry between them, and because of this the surprises in the end are highly impressive - and shocking. The script just could be better, since Young Thugs - Innocent Blood is one of the average efforts of Takashi Miike - despite the few really legendary scenes.

ArtsmagicDVD release is reasonable with the quality of it's picture. Sharpness may not be so called "reference grade" but I guess the original master is somewhat same, when it comes to quality of sharpness. There's also traditional Takashi Miike interview (traditional for ArtsmagicDVD), where the director speaks quietly and peacefully - true to his style. Along with trailer and original cover art there is a matter-of-fact feature telling us about the history of Osaka, because of Riichi Nakaba's and Takashi Miike's origins.