LG / entertainment / MYFILMFRIEND
REVIEW
myFilmFriend brings curated European cinema to the LG living room.
A library-funded film-on-demand service from Germany's filmwerte, built for public libraries across the EU. The webOS port lands the catalogue on the TV where it belongs — at the cost of a sign-in flow that assumes you already know what a library card barcode is.
BY THE APP COMRADE DESK · MAY 11, 2026 · 3 MIN READ
myFilmFriend is what happens when a public library decides to run a streaming service. The catalogue skews toward European arthouse, restored archive material, documentary, and curated children’s programming — the films a commercial streamer would license thinly or not at all because the per-stream economics do not pencil out. filmwerte, the German rights-management outfit behind the platform, has spent the better part of a decade selling library systems on the idea that a film catalogue is exactly the kind of cultural infrastructure a tax-funded institution should be lending out. The webOS app is the living-room face of that bet.
The pitch lands cleanly on an LG TV. Public-library streaming services have historically been a phone or laptop affair, which is the wrong device for an evening of Kieślowski. Putting the catalogue on the TV where people actually watch films changes how often the catalogue gets used. The friction is the front door — library credentials are not as memorable as an email-and-password — but once you are inside, the app gets out of the way and behaves like any other webOS streaming client.
For LG TV owners with a card from a partner library, this is the cheapest way to watch a deep European film catalogue in 2026, and the catalogue is the kind of thing a serious viewer will notice. For everyone else, the app is a closed door — and that closed door is, in a small way, the point.
myFilmFriend is the rare streaming app that asks for a library card instead of a credit card — and the catalogue earns the friction.
FEATURES
myFilmFriend is filmwerte's library-licensed streaming service, available to patrons of partnered public libraries in Germany, Austria, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, and a handful of other European systems. The webOS app is a thin client over the same catalogue that runs on the web, iOS, Android, and Fire TV — around 4,500 titles weighted toward arthouse, European auteur cinema, documentary, and children's programming.
Authentication runs through the library partner. Enter your library identifier and PIN once on the TV; the app holds the session and resolves entitlements against the patron's home institution. Playback streams up to 1080p with subtitle tracks in the original-language plus German, Polish, or whichever local subtitle the library has licensed. There is no Dolby Vision and no Atmos — the licensing model is built around catalogue breadth, not premium-tier finishing.
The webOS-specific behaviour is straightforward: Magic Remote pointer works through the grid, the four colour buttons map to filter / search / favourites / back, and the app remembers playback position across devices through the library account.
MISSION ACCOMPLISHED
The catalogue is the point. Where Netflix and Prime treat European cinema as a thin shelf, myFilmFriend treats it as the spine — Wenders, Haneke, Holland, Holland-adjacent shorts, restored DEFA-era titles, Polish School material that is genuinely hard to find legally elsewhere. The children's section is curated rather than algorithmic, which is the kind of editorial choice a public library would make and a commercial streamer would not.
Pricing is the cleanest line in the category: free, in the sense that any service paid for by your taxes is free. No subscription, no transactional rental, no ad pre-roll. The licensing math is settled between filmwerte and your library, and the app simply lets you in.
ROOM TO IMPROVE
Sign-in is the wall. Library identifier formats vary by partner — some want a 13-digit barcode, some want a six-digit member number, some want an email — and the webOS keyboard does not make any of them quick to enter. First-launch onboarding could explain what to look for; instead it asks for credentials and waits.
Catalogue depth varies meaningfully by participating library, and the app does not surface what a given patron actually has access to until they tap through. A title that shows in the grid may resolve to "not licensed by your library" on play, which is the wrong order of operations.
The recommendation engine is rudimentary. Recently-added and editorial collections do most of the discovery work, and personalised suggestions are thin compared to what even a small commercial streamer offers in 2026.
CONCLUSION
myFilmFriend is the right install for LG TV owners whose local library is a partner — the catalogue is genuinely strong on European cinema and the price is whatever your library card already costs. Patrons outside the partner network get nothing from the app, and the onboarding will not help them figure that out gracefully. Worth a try if your library is on the list at filmfriend.de; skip otherwise.