Cinemas reel in viewers over Spring Festival

Moviegoers line up to purchase tickets at a theater in Wuhan, Hubei province. From Jan 31 to Feb 6, big screens across the country reeled in 1.4 billion yuan ($230 million), a year-on-year growth of 86 percent. Provided to China Daily

Cinemas did booming business during Spring Festival, reaching a record high in box office receipts, according to Tencent.com.

From Jan 31 to Feb 6, big screens across the country reeled in 1.4 billion yuan ($230 million), a year-on-year growth of 86 percent. The whole of January only generated about 1.9 billion yuan in box office takings.

In addition, the number of moviegoers increased by 98 percent from the same dates the previous year, reaching 39 million during the seven days.

The highest-grossing feature movies during the period were The Monkey King and Dad, Where Are We Going? The two films grabbed a 77 percent market share with total ticket sales of 1.08 billion yuan, the first earning 612 million yuan and the latter 468 million yuan.