When Ikuto and Ryoma attend a lecture by a martial artist Mikuru Asakura at a juvenile reformatory, the speech lingers in Ikuto’s mind. Wanting to meet the fighter again, Ikuto decides to participate in BreakingDown, the fighting sport tournament held by Mikuru. The determination inspires Ryoma as well and they both start training at a gym for their bright future; however, their past follows and haunts them even now.

“In just one minute, the strongest will be decided!” Operating from this innovative fighting concept, “Breaking Down” has shattered traditional martial arts ideas and become a social phenomenon in Japan. As further proof of its popularity, the sport has now reached the big screen in the form of Blazing Fists, a film inspired by a speech given at a juvenile detention center by Mikuru Asakura, a charismatic fighter and popular YouTuber, who is also the mastermind behind “Breaking Down.”

Blazing Fists is the coming-of-age story of juvenile hall outcasts attempting to rise from society’s bottom-rung with nothing but their brawn to elevate them. Scripted by Shin Kibayashi, a writer known for his popular manga series The Kindaichi Case Files, Blazing Fists is directed by the internationally renowned Takashi Miike, a director who navigates across genres and borders seamlessly.

Director Takashi Miike broke new ground in the late 1990s with The Way to Fight, and later with the Crows Zero series, films centered around the tribulations of delinquent youths. Tapping the heat and energy of the modern “Breaking Down” fight scene, Miike returns to the youth battle genre for which he is peerless. Under the rallying cry of “A new delinquent youth battle movie that surpasses Crows Zero,” Executive Producer Asakura and “Breaking Down” COO Yuji Mizoguchi have reunited many of the staff and cast of Crows Zero, along with a collection of new actors, to create Blazing Fists.