How Lan Hongchun’s Teochew Film ‘Dear You’ Turned a Forgotten Postal Tradition Into China’s Unlikely Hit: ‘Dialect Is Never Going to Be a Liability as Long as You Have Great Ideas’

Director Lan Hongchun's Teochew-language film *Dear You* has emerged as an unlikely box-office hit in China by focusing on a forgotten postal tradition involving overseas Chinese laborers in the 1950s. The narrative centers on the complex journey required to send a single letter home from Bangkok across the ocean, which historically involved a four-step process: the laborer, a scribe to write the words, and a reader.

Addressing the commercial viability of regional languages in cinema, filmmaker Lan Hongchun asserted that dialect is never a liability as long as creators have great ideas.