In the midsummer of 2017, on the senior high school campus in a small southern town, Wen Xiran, who was repressed by her native family, and Chen Nanzhou, who was lonely and helpless, accidentally crossed paths due to a class rescue. She was trapped in the shackles of family affection, and he carried the burden of life. The two lonely souls comforted each other in the annotations in the wrong question book, the sweet smell of orange candies, and the late-night explanations of exercises, and quietly made a promise to go to Nanjing together and enjoy the phoenix trees.
However, on the eve of the college entrance examination, the rain of reality suddenly fell. The fierce opposition of Wen Xiran's mother and the tragic news that Chen Nanzhou's father was seriously injured at the construction site shattered their dreams. He went to work in Shenzhen overnight to collect medical expenses, leaving behind unkept appointments and yellowed tickets; she walked into the college entrance examination room alone, with a broken heart and was admitted to a university in Nanjing, but there was no one to share her joy with.
In the late autumn of three years, fate reunited the two in the cruelest way - Wen Xiran was diagnosed with cancer and was spending time in the hospital bed; Chen Nanzhou had gone through the bottom struggle, but had not changed his original intention but was unable to change. In the tug-of-war after the reunion, old things awaken the sweet past, but the reality is a gap. Medical expenses, illness, and belated truth make the melancholy of being unable to love spread.
In the end, Wen Xiran passed away among the fallen sycamore leaves in late autumn, leaving behind a note saying "Next time we meet, it will be in spring" and half an orange candy. Chen Nanzhou returns to the small town in late autumn every year with his repaired silver bracelet, and pays homage to his youthful love that was crushed by reality under the sycamore tree. This belated "Late Autumn Letter" is full of misses, regrets and unforgettable longings, making the story of the two teenagers forever fixed in the phoenix trees of Nanjing and the wind of the small southern town.
Intent: Love and regret under the unpredictable fate: using the purity of teenage love to contrast with the cruelty of reality, explore the crushing force majeure on individual destiny, and interpret the eternal longing behind regret.