Review | Dear You movie review: nostalgic Teochew family drama a surprise box office hit in China

3.5/5 stars
Boasting a cast of largely unknown actors and playing out almost entirely in the Teochew (Chiu Chow) dialect of eastern Guangdong, Lan Hongchun’s modestly budgeted drama Dear You has become a runaway success at the mainland Chinese box office.
Its young female lead, Li Sitong, gives a career-making performance, while eagle-eyed viewers will recognise 80-year-old actress Usha Seamkhum from the 2024 Thai blockbuster How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies in a small but notable role.
Dear You follows Hiau-ui (Zheng Runqi), a cash-strapped young Teochew man, as he heads to Thailand in search of his estranged grandfather, Ten Baksheng, who has supposedly been living and thriving there for the last 50 years.

Forced to abandon his wife, Sok-jiu (played at a young age by Wang Xiaohui), and their three young children to avoid being drafted by the Kuomintang during China’s civil war, Baksheng has not returned home since. However, he sent letters and money back home for years – until he appeared to remarry and sever all ties.
As Sok-jiu (Wu Shaoqing) celebrates her 88th birthday, her grandson sets out to track down Baksheng and demand a share of his wealth. Upon arrival in Bangkok, however, Hiau-ui learns that his grandfather has been dead for decades.
This poses the questions: who built an empire of successful schools in his name, and who was responsible for all the poetic love letters Sok-jiu received? All the clues point to a mysterious woman named Nanzhi, whom none of his family knows anything about.

Shamelessly idealistic in its portrayal of love and loyalty spanning decades and hundreds of miles, Dear You homes in on the struggles of Teochew immigrants living in Thailand after the end of World War II, recreating a time and place rarely explored on screen.
The drama also hinges on the now-dormant tradition of qiaopi remittance letters, a vital means of communication between illiterate relatives at home and overseas.
Much like other Chinese hits such as So Young (2013) and Hi, Mom (2021), Lan’s film is a nostalgic throwback to an age exemplified by hard work and modest ambitions.
Baksheng (Wang Yantong) starts with nothing and faces one hardship after another as he ekes out a living in a fastidiously realised 1950s Thailand. His unwavering faithfulness to his family drives him forward, while also earning him the respect and secret adoration of Nanzhi (Li Sitong), a feisty innkeeper’s daughter.

It is their blossoming bond that forms the backbone of Dear You, upon which Lan eagerly pins unifying themes of duty, togetherness and honouring one’s ancestral roots.
Some audiences may struggle to embrace the ethics behind Nanzhi’s pivotal actions as they are slowly revealed, but the film’s unabashedly romantic sensibility is hard to resist and continues to resonate with a wide, multi-generational audience.
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