연의 편지

YEONUI PYEONJI

MOVIE

MOVIE
Dubbed
SOURCE
MANGA
RELEASE
October 1, 2025
LENGTH
97 min

DESCRIPTION

Sori is a unique young girl: kind, caring and principled well beyond her years. Unfortunately, these qualities also make her a prime target for bullying. She transfers schools, and just when it looks like history is about to repeat itself, stumbles across a mysterious trail of letters that takes her on a magical scavenger hunt through a hidden world that exists just beneath the surface of her new middle school... A scavenger hunt that will lead her to rediscover friendship, the wonders of nature, and the goodness that still exists within humanity.

(Source: WEBTOONS)

CAST

So-Ri Lee
Dong-Sun Park

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REVIEWS

Juliko25
84/100
Your Letter is a stellar adaptation of the webtoon, a sweet, wholesome tale of friendship and healing from trauma.
Hey kids! Remember last year, when I read a nice little Korean webcomic called Your Letter? At the time, I had only just learned that an animated movie was in the works. Just recently, it received fansubs, and considering how much I liked the webcomic to the point of buying Ize Press' release of it in book form, I knew I just HAD to watch it! Man, not gonna lie, this was quite the stellar adaptation, not just because it mostly stays true to the source material, but even expands on it to its benefit. Not only that, Your Letter is now the first Korean language movie I've ever watched. If I ever had to have a first, I'm glad I decided to make it this one.

The premise is the same as the webcomic: Middle schooler Sori Lee is going through a rough time. An attempt to stand up to bullies harassing her friend goes awry, resulting in Sori being targeted instead. Her school life has been a living hell since. When the friend she stood up for transfers schools, Sori decides she's had enough of school and decides to do the same. But even after transferring, Sori can't help but feel like nothing has changed...until she finds a mysterious letter taped underneath her desk. This discovery leads to her on a scavenger hunt that she never could have imagined. Sori follows the trail of clues to try and uncover the identity of her benefactor. As she does so, she ends up befriending Dongsoon Park, a quiet and broody schoolmate who seems to be intimately connected to the one who left her the letters. With Dongsoon at her side helping her collect the rest of the letters, she is able to not only explore this new school but meet new people and find new curious and fantastical sights around her. The previously sullen and emotionally beaten girl starts opening up more and more with each new letter she finds as she is reminded why kindness is perhaps the best weapon against a heartless world.

Now, I admit, I'm not as familiar with Korean animation styles and studios as I am Japanese and Western ones, so I'm not privy to any of their visual language and vocabulary. But as far as I can tell, the animation is pretty good. The character designs do lean a bit more stereotypically anime style compared to the comic's more intentionally simplistic look, but they still remain true to the overall look of the webcomic, and you can still recognize the important characters on sight. The environments are nicely rendered, character motion is dynamic, colors are bright and vibrant when needed, and it even manages to translate the some of the author's visual storytelling trademarks into animation. Remember the scene I mentioned in my review of the webcomic, how a scene involving Sori drinking Sooni's tea is used to communicate Sori's change in mental state by coloring her body? The movie decided to translate this into having Sori imagining herself bursting into an explosion of watercolor paint as she revels in how delicious Sooni's tea is. That said, the movie does use a LOT of CGI, usually for objects, but oftentimes they're used even when it's not necessary, such as showing a 2D animated character moving a 3D CGI chess piece. I appreciate that the animation takes care to have them blend somewhat so when a 2D and 3D animated object both move at the same time, it doesn't stick out too much, but I think the movie could have stood to rely less on CGI at times.

I did like the soundtrack quite a bit, even if, just like with Korean animation in general, I'm not as familiar with K-pop as others are. The songs are very good for what they are, and from what I've heard, the actress they got to voice Sori, Lee Su-hyun, even sang some of them. I'm not familiar with her work, but after this, I think I want to learn more, as she's really good here. There was one point where, during the scene where Sori finds Dongsoon's bus hideout, there's a nice song playing, but right as Sori meets Dongsoon, the song very abruptly cuts out during the scene transition, which really threw me off. The hell? Couldn't they have just let it play or fade it out during that particular transition? Not sure what prompted them to do that, but whatever. The voice acting is also fairly good. I'm not familiar with any of these voice actors at all, but I enjoyed their performances, even if the boys sounded a bit too similar at times.

As far as changes from the comic, Your Letter still manages to be a faithful adaptation, keeping the core story, themes, and characters in tact. That's not to say there weren't any changes at all. During one scene, a hidden spot in the bushes Sori and some other girls have lunch in is changed to a gazebo with wisterias hanging from it, which is nice, but I still wonder why they felt the need to change it. The movie also cut out a scene from the comic where Sori and Dongsoon have to track down a rabbit that escaped from the school's rabbit hutch, which builds their friendship a bit more. Interestingly enough, the movie also expands on things from the comic. For example, the group of girls Sori befriends have more screentime here than they do in the comic, there's a scene where they all watch Dongsoon's archery competition, and one particular bit involving an antagonist from Dongsoon's past is expanded into a whole chase scene that I honestly felt to be much more satisfying than the comic, and a nice thematic cap off to both Sori and Dongsoon's arcs. There were also some cute bits where the title of the movie would appear on things like a poem or a cassette tape (I'm assuming this takes place during the 90s, as there's cassette tapes and landline phones, but correct me if I'm wrong). Luckily, these changes don't negatively affect the characters or their characterization any. The movie retains the themes of the comic and does a good job at keeping the characters' development consistent and faithful across the board. Sori and Dongsoon carry the movie on their backs, and if they tried to go against their established characterization from the comic, the movie's themes wouldn't work.

I honestly don't have much in the way of complaints about the movie, as even with the things it cuts out, Your Letter still manages to not only be a good movie on its own, but a faithful adaptation of the comic. Any complaints I could have about it are the same as the comic, i.e. Sori and another character mentioned to have health issues but no elaboration beyond that, the setting being mainly restricted to the school, and Sori's friend Ji-Min not being as fleshed out as she could have been despite being the reason why Sori's role in the story happens. But like with the comic, none of these issues hindered my enjoyment of the movie. I would gladly recommend Your Letter to anyone who wants a nice, wholesome, hopeful tale of friendship, healing, and the value of kindness in a cruel world. I'm honestly surprised nobody has picked this up for a blu-ray release in the US yet considering Korean media has become quite popular nowadays. Hey, GKids or AnimEigo, wanna get on that? Because I'll buy a blu-ray for this day one!
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