Cinemas in Beijing earned the lion's share of the Chinese box office last year, reaping 1.18 billion yuan (178 million U.S. dollars), figures from the municipal film watchdog show.

Beijing has topped the annual box office chart for Chinese cities for four consecutive years.

Takings in 2010 grew 46 percent year on year, according to a Beijing Municipal Bureau of Radio, Film and Television statement Thursday.

The country's State Administration of Radio, Film and Television said China's overall box office surpassed 10 billion yuan in 2010, a new record.

Eighteen cinemas opened in Beijing last year, taking the city's total number of screens to over 500, said the statement.

Some 4,000 people are employed by the city's cinemas, the statement said.

Addressing the city's unbalanced cinema development, the bureau will continue to subsidize the construction of cinemas outside the city's central areas, an unnamed bureau official said, according to a report in the Beijing Daily newspaper Friday.