A film with an investment of 80 million yuan must earn at least 200 million yuan so that its producers could make their ends meet, Han said recently in an interview with the Shanghai-based Wen Hui Daily.

China produced 406 films in 2008, according to a report produced by the Chinese Film Association in June. The total box office returns in China last year stood at 4.3 billion yuan and 60 percent or 2.58 billion came from the domestic movies, he added.

'In a mature film industry, the box office is not the only source of revenue,' said Jiang Defu, director of the marketing department under the China Film Group Corporation.

In Hollywood, 30 percent of the revenues come from the box office, while the remaining 70 percent come from other sources, including advertisement, he said.

'We still need to learn from their experience. Chinese film producers should not only attract audience into cinema but also explore the market out of the cinema (theatres),' he said.