Given these facts, the challenge for sci-fi filmmakers to tell a good story is greater than those making films in other genres. Script and screenplay writers, and directors of sci-fi flicks have a tougher task than those working on traditional themes, because they have to let their imagination fly while adhering to logic and the laws of science and engineering. There are few professionally trained people who could measure up to this challenge.

Although most of the science fiction writers will be happy to see their works made into films, there are no successful precedents. Chen Qiufan, a science fiction writer who studied Chinese literature and is a film and television director, says many filmmakers have consulted him about adapting his works for movies, but nothing feasible has emerged "until now". By feasible, he means the filmmaking team's qualifications, experience and competence in handling such a subject. Going by Chen, very few filmmaking teams in China have the ability to make a good sci-fi movie.

Fei Dao, another young science fiction writer, corroborates Chen, saying it's not difficult to find financers for sci-fi movies in China, nor is technology an obstacle. "As far as I know some Chinese digital studios have earned contracts for special effects of many foreign blockbusters ... (so) the main challenge is how script and screenplay writers and directors will handle a sci-fi story."

But there is a first in every field. Despite doubts about the film production team's competence and the difficulty in adapting a sci-fi work for a film, China's top science fiction writer Liu Cixin announced recently that he has agreed to turn his masterpiece, Three Bodies, perhaps China's best contemporary science fiction work, into a film. Liu will also be the film's producer. So have Chinese sci-fi movies eventually set sail? We have to wait for the answer.

The author is a writer with China Daily. wangyiqing@chinadaily.com.cn