Friend

Friend is a 2001 Korean crime drama written and directed by Kwak Kyung-taek. It follows four men who grow up together in Busan despite very different family backgrounds: Joon-seok, whose father heads a criminal organization; Dong-soo, a doctor's son; Jeong-ho, raised by a smuggler; and Sang-taek, who comes from a comfortable home and excels at school. Their shared adolescence gives way to diverging paths in adulthood. Sang-taek and Jeong-ho go on to university, while Joon-seok and Dong-soo enter rival gangs. That split shapes the rest of the film, as old loyalties are measured against the lives the friends have chosen.

The film was Kwak's second feature, following Doctor K in 1999, and he returned to the same characters years later with Friend: The Great Legacy in 2013. Yu Oh-seong plays Joon-seok, Jang Dong-gun plays Dong-soo, Seo Tae-hwa plays Sang-taek, Jung Woon-taek plays Jeong-ho, and Kim Bo-kyung and Ki Joo-bong appear among a credited cast of 70. It was produced by Hyun Gyeong Lim through Korea Pictures and Cineline 2, runs 118 minutes, and took about 44 million USD worldwide. On TMDB it holds a 6.9/10 rating from 105 votes.