Photo: ©Well Go USA Entertainment
Dear You
Modern-day Chaoshan, Xiaowei, broke and desperate, hears that his long-missing grandfather may be alive in Thailand, and may have money. A lot of money. Off he goes, treating family history like a debt-relief plan. Then, the search goes from comic scramble to emotional ambush, as the letters that kept Xiaowei’s grandmother waiting for decades open a story of love and devotion sealed for half a century. A small family film in the Chaoshan dialect, known across much of Southeast Asia as Teochew, Dear You is built around qiaopi, the old letters and remittances sent home by overseas Chinese across the region. It sports none of the usual industry armor: no franchise, no built-in IP, no liuliang stars with fan armies ready to flood the algorithm, just classic heartfelt timeless storytelling. Word of mouth has turned Dear You into one of China’s breakout hits of the year, and Li Sitong and Wang Yantong into the year’s unlikeliest screen discoveries.
