Box office sales reach 149 million yuan

(Kunshan Daily)

The long-awaited Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) was screened at the beginning of this year. Poly Int'l Cinemas Kunshan saw its box office sales from this film alone break 500,000 yuan ($76,000) within a few days, which is a good beginning for this year's box office sales in Kunshan. According to Kunshan Bureau of Culture, Radio, Film and Television, Press and Publication (KBCRFTPP), the city's 14 cinemas screened a total of 282 domestic or foreign films last year, the box office sales hit a record RMB149 million yuan, up by 43.27% from the same period of previous year, and the number of movie viewers was 4.42 million.

Last year, domestic films won a larger market share as the main force. As briefed by Hu Jinfu, Deputy Director of the Radio, Film and Television Division of KBCRFTPP, 282 films were screened in Kunshan last year, among which there were 193 domestic films, taking up 68 percent, and 89 imported films, taking up 32 percent. Out of the top ten box office hits such as Monster Hunt, Fast & Furious, Lost in Hong Kong, etc., there were six domestic films.

"Besides, people have changed their mindset now. Film has gradually changed from a luxurious cultural experience to daily cultural consumer goods. Young people in the city, in particular, have become major customers, and the movie-going population born after 1995 is growing rapidly," said Hu Jinfu.

In order to make it easier for people to see movies, Kunshan added three new cinemas last year, i.e. Zhongchuan Int'l Cinemas Kunshan, Qianying Int'l Cinemas Kunshan and Lumiere Pavilions Kunshan. Currently, there are 14 cinemas, 11,968 seats and 86 screens in Kunshan. At the same time, some cinemas have kept updating their facilities. "Last year, we upgraded our 3D cinema and replaced our 3D glasses to make film-watching more comfortable. Our box office revenue was RMB22 million yuan, up by 50% from the same period of previous year," said Xu Chunning, General Manager of Poly Int'l Cinemas Kunshan.

What's more, the cinemas' internet marketing means are more diversified than before, while group-purchase ticketing and automatic ticket vendor provide more convenient ticket channels. As statistics show, the proportion of audiences who bought tickets via cinemas' official websites or ticketing websites broke 50 percent for the first time last year, and 77.7 percent of them bought online tickets because they were cheap. "I always group-purchase my film tickets through the internet. It's easy, and more importantly, the price is reasonable. For a RMB80 yuan ticket, you can group-buy it at only RMB30 yuan," said Ms. Tang Shuting.

In recent years, the annual film box office revenue in Kunshan has been reaching a record high from year to year, outdoing most other county-level cities in Jiangsu Province. This year, the city will have three new cinemas and some cinemas will also introduce high-end facilities to fully satisfy the demand for movie watching.