Friend is part coming-of-age, part gritty gangster film. Throughout the film, these two elements never fail to diminish; they're always constant. Yet another example of how school, family and society shapes a person. How these kids get hit and slapped when they do something wrong as a punish, how parents are blamed for these actions and how they fall in society's pitfalls because of the life they're born in to and how they're forced to live it. "If we went to the same middle school, I would have been in the right direction. Competition is prevalent is a place where you have to be the best—to survive. And because of that, relationships are sacrificed. While friendship is an overarching theme, Friend doesn't start with melodrama. The greatest act of friendship is probably punishing yourself out of the shame and humiliation because you cannot save your friend even if you have the power. Friend doesn't try too hard. It's straightforward, it's simple and it gets what it wants to across. Perhaps, it just drags on too much where the later part (when they have grown up) feels lopsided compared to when they were younger. Ultimately, that suffers. But the power is in portraying its characters.