China's movie box office revenue soared 9 percent in 2018 to 60.98 billion yuan or $8.88 billion, the State Film Administration said on Monday.
Domestic films contributed 62.15 percent to the market. The number of movie screens reached 60,079 across the country, up 9,303 from 2017.
The top 10 list of highest-grossing films is split evenly among Chinese films and Hollywood blockbusters.
The year 2018 witnessed three domestic films raking in more than 3 billion yuan at the box office, while the top highest-grossing foreign film only pocketed more than 2 billion yuan from Chinese movie-goers.
Overall, foreign films make up almost half of all movies in the Chinese market, but their earning power is not as strong as it was before. Ten years ago, Hollywood blockbusters firmly secured the top places in yearly box office announcements.
Whether China could reach the goal it set for its domestic box office had been a hot topic in the film industry since last month's box office receipts exceeded last year's total revenue of 50 billion yuan.
"Operation Red Sea," " Detective Chinatown 2" and "Dying to Survive" were the the top 3 contributors to the box office this year, raking in 3.65 billion yuan, 3.4 billion yuan and 3.1 billion yuan, respectively. Together, the three films grossed nearly 10.15 billion yuan or 16.9 percent of the annual box office.
Meanwhile, "Aquaman" is expected to surpass "Venom" and rise to the seventh place in the box office.
In 2018, a total of 393 domestic films were released in theaters, accounting for 62 percent of the total movies shown in China, with the remaining 38 percent, or 122 films, consisting of imported titles.
Eighty films racked up more than 100 million yuan, of which 16 brought in more than one billion yuan.
According to data, domestic films have outperformed foreign movies this year.
Six of the top 10 box office films so far have been domestic productions, with "Operation Red Sea" topping the list. "Avengers: Infinity War" ranked first among foreign movies, taking in 2.39 billion yuan at the box office.
So far, 14 films are confirmed to debut in China during the 2019 Spring Festival in February. Next year's Spring Festival box office is also expected to set a new record, exceeding that of the 2018 Chinese New Year.
（Source:ourjiangsu.com）
