Movies like Boys (2018)
The best movies like Boys (2018) are El Chicano (2019), Siberian Education (2013) and One Week Friends (2022). If Boys hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedA Sun (2019)7.7/10 from 275 votes
- NewestPlay Dirty (2025)Released 2025
- In ChineseOne Week Friends (2022)Also in Chinese
El Chicano (2019)
A pair of twin brothers from East L.A. choose to live their lives differently and end up on opposite sides of the law.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSiberian Education (2013)
The story of a gang of children growing up in a community of banished criminals, in a forgotten corner of the former Soviet Union. This community rejects the world outside. The only law it obeys… is its own. Against this backdrop two best friends, Kolyma and Gagarin, gradually become fierce enemies as they find themselves on opposite sides of the strict code of honour of the ‘honest criminal’ brotherhood.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOne Week Friends (2022)
A high school student suffers from a strange amnesia, causing her memories to only last a week. After she befriends a new student, his kindness and persistence make her gradually open up.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisS.W.A.T. (2019)
The story centers on the Chinese Special Police Unit, from their hard training to their first mission.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA World Without Thieves (2004)
A con-team couple head west after taking a city businessman for his BMW. But an encounter with a naive young carpenter traveling home with his life savings challenges their fate as thieves.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFast Girls (2012)
A street smart runner develops an intense rivalry with an equally ambitious wealthy young athlete.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMr. Tree (2011)
Teased by hallucinations, Shu, a slacker living in a rural village, struggles with an ever-loosening grip on reality. Yet when one of his visions manifests as real, his fellow villagers come to regard him as a clairvoyant. Can Shu genuinely see into the future? Is he actually just a basket case? Or is he perhaps more lucid than he seems, and pulling a fast one on everyone?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDirt (2018)
In search of a lifeline for his struggling off road racing team, a man takes on a young car thief looking for a second chance, but as their worlds collide, they must struggle to forge a successful alliance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPhantom Halo (2014)
Two brothers barely scrape by as their father continues to gamble and drink away the money they do bring home. They hatch a plan for a robbery but at what price?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisPickpocket (1997)
A small town pickpocket whose friends have moved on to higher trades finds himself bitter and unable to adapt.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAmerican Dreams in China (2013)
Three Chinese friends build a successful English language school to help Chinese teenagers fulfil their dreams.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPlay Dirty (2025)
Expert thief Parker gets a shot at a major heist, but to pull it off he and his team must outsmart a South American dictator, the New York mob, and the world's richest man.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFox Hunt (2025)
Based on true events. Dai Yichen, the Shanghai-based mastermind of a massive financial fraud who has been on the run for seven years, resurfaces in Paris. Chinese economic crime detective Ye Jun leads the "Fox Hunt Team" on a cross-border mission to recover the stolen assets. When the hunter becomes the hunted, can the Fox Hunt Team make a comeback against all odds?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAll Day and a Night (2020)
While serving life in prison, a young man looks back at the people, the circumstances and the system that set him on the path toward his crime.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisUnder the Light (2023)
Officers Su Jianming and Li Huilin investigate a crime involving wealthy businessman Li Zhitian. As clues emerge, the investigation becomes more and more like a game of chess.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisHardball (2001)
An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNo Man's Land (1987)
A rookie cop goes undercover to infiltrate a gang of car thieves led by smooth and charming Ted. The rookie becomes too involved and starts to enjoy the thrill and lifestyle of the game, and becomes romanticly involved with the leaders sister.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Sun (2019)
A family of four fractures under the weight of unmet expectations, unexpected tragedy, and uncompromising pride.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRev (2020)
A young thief with a history of grand theft auto becomes an informant and helps police bring down a criminal enterprise involved in the smuggling of hundreds of exotic super cars.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEmpire (2002)
Big time drug dealer Victor Rosa is looking to get out of the game and sees his chance with a big deal with a new friend who happens to be a Wall St. stockbroker. Thinking this will be his chance to go out on top, Victor soon finds out that he's been double crossed and his last option is to get revenge.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Love Dog (2009)
Originally conceived as the film for government propaganda but couldn't pass the censorship. Five punks found Dong Jianguo, a millionaire wearing the dog chain being trapped in the trunk. They kidnapped the millionaire and started to konw the love story between Dong Jianguo and a woman called Bobo.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Call If You Need Me (2009)
Gentle, easy-going Or Kia moves from the countryside to Kuala Lumpur to work for his cousin and best friend Ah Soon, a mid-level gangster and enforcer. While Or Kia works hard to put a sister through school, Ah Soon cares for an unstable girlfriend prone to mysterious disappearances. As they both sink deeper into a nocturnal world of debts, drugs, and betrayal, Or Kia's loyalties are strained when Ah Soon falls out of favor with the bosses and tries to escape the business.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Wolf (2019)
Poet Wolf (Lang) chose to starve himself to death, in a beautiful flower blossoming Spring. This is a poetic, aesthetic and brutal film that adapted from the true stoy of Poet Wo Fu's suicide.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
I Have Nothing to Say (2017)
The Chinese police visit head-teacher Chen at home. Her daughter, a dissident filmmaker living in Hong Kong, plans yet another critical film about China's colonization of the small autonomous territory. The authorities demand that Chen travel to her daughter to stop the film project. What they do not take into account is that Chen and her daughter lost contact long ago.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Good Cats (2008)
Luo Liang, a young man trying to meet the expectations of family and work, has come to town looking for something better but is unsure of his lot in life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Burned Wings (2012)
This crime drama follows a group of young men, who at face value just appear to be nasty thugs that above all else are up for a good fight. Trying desperately to make a name for themselves and become the type of gangsters people bow down to, Zheng cleverly takes the edge off the brutality by balancing it with some charmingly dry humour.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
My Milk Cup Cow (2014)
The father tells his daughter Nunu a lie that there is a cow in her milk cup. She believes it and drinks up milk, but there isn't any cow. Her father tells her a variety of lies, which Nunu finds increasingly difficult to believe.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
River Straying (2019)
A man who was hiding for 7 years to avoid creditors has embarked on his journey home because of the death of his mother. On the way back home, the childhood memories stroke him constantly just like dreams. In search of a notebook full of poems written for his ex-wife, he went to the former factory to find an old friend. Elsewhere in the city, three senior students are talking about their future plans. All the wandering man under the bridge, the little boy in his childhood and the young senior students, imperceptibly but inexorably are linked together by the river, and the memory has been revived.....
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
A Firecracker Story (2021)
An 8-year-old boy searching for fireworks on a Chinese New Year's Eve, after the firework ban is introduced in this southern Chinese town.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Beer! Beer! (2020)
"Beer! Beer!" is an "anti-romantic comedy" set in the early morning following a wild party in Berlin. When Tao, a Chinese guy, meets Sebastian, a local German. As they seem to get more and more intimate with each other, suddenly a mattress changes everything...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Like Boys and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Boys?
The closest matches to Boys are El Chicano (2019), Siberian Education (2013) and One Week Friends (2022). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Boys?
Start with El Chicano (2019), the closest match to Boys.
What is the highest-rated movie like Boys?
A Sun (2019), rated 7.7/10 by 275 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Boys?
Play Dirty (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Chinese movies like Boys?
Yes: One Week Friends (2022), S.W.A.T. (2019) and A World Without Thieves (2004).
How are movies similar to Boys chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Boys, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.