Last year, the total box-office sales in the country reached 40.05 billion yuan ($6.18 billion). (Photo : www.techinasia.com)
In 2014, the Chinese film industry received warm support from the central government, who spent 290 million yuan to make quality film titles, according to official figures.
Sources from the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) stated that the recipients of the financial aid were 217 films, covering a wide-ranging film genre, such as drama, rural life, children, education, animation and documentary, among others.
Since the 1993 and 2002 reforms, the film industry of the country has seen rapid development. Some of the measures crafted to bring such growth are the lifting of government control over film distribution, consolidating film production firms into bigger cooperatives, and giving theater chains the liberty to set prices.
The revenue that the film industry generated last year, which tallied up to nearly 30 billion yuan, is 32 times what the industry gathered in 2002.
According to SARFT, last week's box-office performance was a feat for the local film industry, with the Saturday receipts surpassing the 400-million-yuan mark, a single-day record in China's history.
For the first half of this year, SARFT revealed that the government has also invested a total of 444 million yuan both into the construction and upgrade of over 700 county-level digital theaters located in China's central and western regions.
Another 334 million yuan was poured in as an investment for establishing cinemas in the country's key impoverished areas.
A massive amount worth 194 million yuan was also allocated as part of the government's effort to boost the growth of China's cultural industry. The monetary aid is aimed at supporting the use of modern technology in film production, construction of professional film-themed online portals, and film companies' foray into the international market, among other aspects.
