Arthouse Audit: 'Catfish' Catches More Cash
Catfish added theaters and continued to entice viewers with its mysterious premise, moving in to first place on the limited chart. Never Let Me Go also successfully expanded, while new releases You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger and Waiting for Superman had strong debuts in just a few theaters.

In its second weekend, Catfish grossed $452,580 at 57 locations for a per-theater average of $7,940. This brings its total to $811,280, and it will likely expand further in the coming weeks.

After an impressive six-week stay atop the limited chart, Get Low was finally knocked down to second place. The Robert Duvall-Bill Murray comedy dipped 43 percent to $317,164 from 354 locations for a total of $8.3 million.

Mao's Last Dancer added 24 theaters for a total of 122 and was up 15 percent to $273,176. Through its seventh weekend, the ballet drama has earned $3.01 million.

Never Let Me Go went from four locations to 26 and earned $241,943. This translates to a solid per-theater average of $9,306, and the movie will definitely see further expansion in October. The Keira Knightley-Carey Mulligan-Andrew Garfield drama has made $438,535 through its first 12 days.

Woody Allen's You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger grossed $160,103 at six locations for a five-day total of $211,445. Its per-theater average of $26,684 was slightly down from that of Allen's last movie Whatever Works, which actually opened in a few more theaters and went on to earn $5.3 million.

Much-hyped documentary Waiting for Superman found $139,033 at four venues for a weekend-best per-theater average of $34,758. This is also the sixth-best opening average this year, though it's just under half of what director Davis Guggenheim's high-profile documentary An Inconvenient Truth opened to four years ago. It remains to be seen whether Superman, which shines a critical light on America's public school system, can ultimately achieve similar mainstream success.

Buried, which finds Ryan Reynolds as a contractor who gets buried alive in Iraq, dug up $100,268 from 11 locations. It had a decent per-theater average of $9,115, though if this falls off drastically next weekend there's an off-chance distributor Lionsgate reconsiders its plan for a wide expansion on Oct. 8.

After last weekend saw more than a dozen new limited releases, this weekend was comparably quiet. Family drama Like Dandelion Dust, which is the first feature from Blue Collar Releasing, earned a solid $77,960 from 25 venues. Howl, which stars James Franco as controversial author Allen Ginsburg, earned $51,195 from six locations. Gaspar Noé thriller Enter the Void debuted to $43,651 at three venues for a solid per-theater average of $14,550. Finally, documentary A Mother's Courage: Talking Back to Autism made a meager $822 at two locations.

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