How a Small Chinese Drama Became a $300 Million Phenomenon

Director Lan Hongchun’s plan was to make a small drama about the Chinese diaspora, then hope the audiences would connect with its tale of family, of love and loss.   

Little did he know what he was in for.

Lan’s Dear You has this year been an unprecedented success in China and beyond. Made for around $2 million, the film has grossed around $300 million across its run on the Chinese mainland and then found impressive numbers as it rolled out across Asia — including Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia.

Audiences everywhere warmed to its tale of romance and sacrifice and have connected with the fact that is centered around families separated because of fate.

“Seeing such enthusiastic responses is deeply moving,” says the director. “To genuinely see that a story we carefully crafted has truly touched countless hearts and brought to light the family memories hidden within so many people — it makes all the creative effort worthwhile.”

Dear You comes to Toronto this week as part of the China Film Showcase of six features after being released across North America on September 4. The slate at TIFF will be screening from September 14-16 at the TIFF Lightbox, under the guidance of China Film Administration and being hosted by the China Film Co-production Corporation. It reflects a growing diversity in content emerging from China that industry watchers have tagged as a direct response to an audience that’s increasingly looking to be entertained by more than simply the blockbusters that first drove the market as it emerged as a global force around 15 years ago.

Alongside Dear You’s quiet dramatics, the showcase features the likes of the comedy-drama The Lychee Road, set in the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and based on a successful novel about a lowly servant with big dreams. There’s also the inspiring coming-of-age drama Big World, which stars the former pop idol Jackson Yee in his breakthrough dramatic role as a boy born with cerebral palsy.

Lan — who’s previous films, such as 2022’s Back to Love, have also focused on China’s ethnic Teochew community — believes the success of these smaller-budgeted films has been driven in no small way by the way contemporary filmmakers are presented with information about movies.

“With the rise of internet recommendation algorithms, these small-scale, personalized, niche-story films can find more space,” says Lan. “It also gives more creators the chance to make small-budget stories that can more precisely reach their audiences. So I believe there are more opportunities for individualized narrative expression.”

The China Film Showcase comes to Toronto as the industry back home is increasingly making noise about a post-pandemic claw-back in revenue. While the Chinese government has thrown its weight behind the industry, the numbers over these past few months are cause for optimism.

By last month, China’s box office hit $3.57 billion, down 31.8 per cent from the same time last year. But state-run media last week noted summer office revenue was up from the same period in 2025 — marginally — to $1.84 billion from $1.78 billion, with admissions rising to 340 million from 321 million in 2025. Still way off the records for summer set in 2023 — close to $3 billion in revenue with 504 million admissions — but a welcome change, nonetheless, that media put down to “the quality and diversity of this year’s film slate” and as “a bright spot after several sluggish seasons.”

Lan believes his own film’s success was boosted by the resonance felt both in China and beyond. Dear You uses the cultural phenomenon of qiaopi — or letters or money sent home from overseas — as the foundation of his story. It traces the path of a young man (Wang Yantong) who travels to Thailand to find his grandfather, only to find the man’s story is not what he was led to believe.

Many families in modern China — especially among the Teochew community in which the film is set — have either first-hand experiences of, or have heard countless stories around the kitchen table about, the stresses and loneliness of immigration.

“It’s a story about migrating to Southeast Asia, and that phenomenon was a grand historical event across China’s southeastern coastal areas, involving millions of people and directly connected to many Chinese families in those regions,” explains the filmmaker. “So in China’s qiaoxiang [the hometowns of overseas Chinese], the story evokes strong resonance — audiences easily associated with their own ancestors’ experiences and naturally empathize with it.”

Adds Lan: “Many viewers, after watching the film, would voluntarily share their own family histories with us, saying that the story told in the film felt just like the past of their own grandparents and ancestors. In a sense, this film carries the shared memories of many Chinese families who migrated to Southeast Asia.”

The film has also continued a recent phenomenon in China of turning the places where it is either set or shot into tourist attractions — both domestic and international — much like other recent hits likw the sports comedy Pegasus 3 (shot in Delingha) and the comedy Her Story (Shanghai).

“It has significantly boosted the visibility and popularity of the Chaoshan region,” says Lan. “In the past two to three months, there has also been a noticeable increase in overseas Chinese returning to China to reunite with their families, and online you can see many real stories of overseas Chinese descendants coming back to Chaoshan to trace their roots and successfully finding their relatives. The film has spurred a tourism boom in Chaoshan, with visitor numbers surging in recent months.”

Dear You has also already proved a hit on the international festival circuit — before arriving at TIFF it closed the New York Asian Film Festival to much acclaim.

Says Lan: “The biggest feeling I get is still surprise. And also a fuller confidence in what I have always insisted on — earnestly portraying individual destinies and sincerely sharing my own life experiences. Screening at festivals and receiving recognition and encouragement from many jurors has proven that our creative approach is not wrong. It makes us more determined to continue on the same path we’ve been taking.”