Movies Like Friend
If you loved Friend's Action and Drama storytelling, these films deliver a similar experience — carefully selected for tone, themes, and emotional depth. Each pick includes where to watch it right now.
★ Top Picks
Gangnam Blues
Jong-dae and Yong-ki make a living by picking up paper and empty bottles. Both then join different gangster clan and becomes involved in a struggle of political interests over development in Gangnam, Seoul.
What Doesn't Kill You
Two childhood friends from South Boston turn to crime as a way to get by, ultimately causing a strain in their personal lives and their friendship.
Rough Cut
Gang-pae is #2 gangster in his organization who longs to become an actor. Su-ta is a superstar actor who takes on the role of a gangster in an action movie called Rough Cut. When another actor leaves the set due to Su-tas violent ways, the production is on the verge of shutting down. Su-ta asks Gang-pae, whom he met by chance, to play alongside him in the movie in order to save the production.
A Better Tomorrow
An idealistic policeman must bring down his estranged older brother, now a powerful gangster in a South Korean port city.
The Perfect Weapon
Jeff, a young delinquent, is enrolled by his father in a kenpo school, in the hopes of teaching the boy some self-discipline. Years later, Jeff's mentor, Kim, is being threatened by one of the Korean mafia families. Jeff tries to help his old friend, but is too late to prevent Kim's death at the hands of an unknown hitman. Vowing revenge, Jeff takes on all of the families, using his martial arts skills to find the man who killed his friend.
The Con Artists
A wily safecracker is forced to help a mob boss pull off a $150 million heist, but smells a double-cross in the works.
A Dirty Carnival
A small-time thug who collects debts for the local triad is torn between his criminal aspirations and his devotion to family.
Confession
Hyun-tae, In-chul and Min-soo have been best friends since childhood. Their relationship is forever changed after Hyun-tae's mother asks In-chul to commit insurance fraud by destroying her arcade.
More Movies Like Friend
Bloody Tie
A crystal meth dealer with a tragic past is forced to team up with a renegade cop to take down a powerful crime lord.
Gangster High
Sang-ho is an ordinary high school student. His dream is to enter the military academy under the influence of his father who is an army colonel. As entering high school, he became friends with Jae-gu, Chang-bae, Kyung-chul, Hong-kyu and Sang-sik. They grouped a soccer team called 'Tiger', building up friendship by playing soccer. Sang-ho and his friends ran into group of fight with seniors, these incidents made everybody in school to misunderstand them as they were serious group of gangster. When Sang-ho gets becomes close with a girl whose boyfriend is a boss of another school's gangster group, things are going worse.
Absolution
An aging ex-boxer gangster working as muscle for a Boston crime boss receives an upsetting diagnosis. Despite a faltering memory, he attempts to rectify the sins of his past and reconnect with his estranged children. He is determined to leave a positive legacy for his grandson, but the criminal underworld isn’t done with him and won’t loosen their grip willingly.
Unstoppable
Dong-chul and Ji-soo are a happily married couple. One day, Dong-chul comes home to find his house in disarray and his wife missing.
Run
When a law student accidentally kills the son of a mob boss in a fight, he finds himself relentlessly pursued by the mob and the police.
Quick
A biker is forced to deliver a ticking time bomb by a mysterious caller who has put an explosive helmet on his ex-girlfriend.
Sheroes
When four thick-as-thieves friends arrive in Thailand, they quickly find themselves in over their heads. Fighting to stay alive, they employ their unique set of skills and unleash their fierce loyalty in a heart-pumping battle for survival.
Nameless Gangster
A corrupt customs official joins forces with a vicious gangster to form the most powerful crime partnership in Busan.
The Show Must Go On
A middle-aged gangster's lifetime of mistakes catch up with him as his personal and professional life is destroyed.
The City of Violence
Tae-su, a detective fighting organized crime, returns to his hometown for his high school friend Wang-jae's funeral. There, he meets his old friends Pil-ho, Dong-hwan and Seok-hwan and they reminisce. Suspecting something fishy about Wang-jae's death, Tae-su and Seok-hwan start investigating it, each in his own way. Their investigations lead to a land development project that Pil-ho is directing.
Night in Paradise
An assassin named Tae-goo is offered a chance to switch sides with his rival Bukseong gang, headed by Chairman Doh. Tae-goo rejects the offer that results in the murder of his sister and niece. In revenge, Tae-goo brutally kills Chairman Doh and his men and flees to Jeju Island where he meets Jae-yeon, a terminally ill woman. Though, the henchman of the Bukseong gang, Executive Ma is mercilessly hunting Tae-goo to take revenge.
State Property
A Philadelphia gang member becomes a drug kingpin and starts a feud with vicious rivals in his quest for the American Dream.
Why These Movies Are Similar
These recommendations share core qualities with Friend (2001): Action and Drama themes, similar narrative structure, and comparable emotional depth. NoBadPicks uses a combination of TMDB collaborative filtering, genre matching, and AI analysis to surface films most likely to resonate with fans of Friend.
See full details for Friend (2001)