Seattle's "Humpday" makes a deal at Sundance

Seattle filmmaker Lynn Shelton's third feature, "Humpday," was one of the first movies to ink a distribution deal at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, over the weekend. Magnolia Pictures bought worldwide rights to the film, for a dollar amount described by Variety as "mid-six figures," and plans to release it theatrically in August following a video-on-demand campaign.

At the festival, Shelton said, "This is beyond my wildest dreams." She added that some people who worked on the movie were paid in shares, so now they will see paychecks.

Shelton met with several potential buyers and went with Magnolia because they seemed the most dedicated to showing the movie to the greatest number of people, promising theatrical release in at least 15 cities.

"They won us over immediately. They seemed passionate about the film and thought with the right marketing, it could get to a wider audience than you would normally get for a small film like this," she said.

The comedy, shot in Seattle last year and starring Mark Duplass ("The Puffy Chair") and Joshua Leonard ("The Blair Witch Project") is the story of two straight men who film themselves having sex with each other as an art project.

Writer Christy Karras contributed to this report.