Dai Jinhua, Peking University film scholar. [Photo provided to China Daily]

"An excellent movie could be a museum of the mind, or a miniature of the world. Despite it (the thoughts learned from films) cannot be converted into cash, it could be your spiritual treasure that no one else can take away," she writes.

Predicting the future of Chinese cinema, Dai says the market had once expanded too fast, with most of its sections ranging from script writing to post production procedure yet to form a mature and standardized system.

"The Chinese film industry needs to make progress in a more stable and sound way," she says. "Besides, cinema is a type of artistic and cultural product, making its major value established on exploring humanity or reflecting societal issues. The importance of relatable storytelling should never be underestimated."

Although theaters are currently struggling with a lackluster market, Dai says China's population of 1.4 billion indicates it can provide a huge audience base to secure a promising prospect.

"Even in case of a worst situation, if the domestic market is forced to shrink to a smaller scale, the number of audiences will still be big enough to support the film industry," she says.