Xiang Fan's exemplary ethnography lifts the lid on China's cinephile culture, caught between the market economy and one-party state, to reveal the venue operators, amateur critics, and fansubbers whose dedication and determination makes it survive – and often even thrive.

Chris Berry, King's College London, UK

Contemporary Art Cinema Culture in China challenges the mainstream/independent dichotomy in Chinese film studies scholarship; it offers a much-needed non-Western perspective on the global discourse of art cinema. Shifting the research focus from the film text to the audience, from institutions to individuals, and from production to circulation, exhibition and consumption, the book champions a welcome sociological and ethnographic approach to the study of film culture.

Hongwei Bao, author of Queer Media in China

In her absorbing study of contemporary Chinese art cinema's distribution, exhibition, and consumption, Xiang Fan reveals, though interviews and participant observation, how a range of institutions and intermediaries-from film programmers to fan subbers and from internet critics to pirate DVD vendors-help shape this emerging film culture.

Luke Robinson, University of Sussex, UK