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How long has David Permut been going to the Sundance Film Festival? Since before they called it that.

"My habit is five movies a day," said the veteran movie producer over the phone this week. "I really go to watch movies."

This year, Permut also is coming to Park City to sell a movie.

Though he's known for big-budget movies — his credits include Bruce Willis' 1987 movie debut "Blind Date," the 1997 John Travolta/Nicolas Cage action movie "Face/Off" and this year's World War II drama "Hacksaw Ridge" — Permut, 62, also makes indie films, and his production "The Polka King" premieres Sunday night at the Eccles Center Theatre in Park City.

It's going to be his challenge to cut through the din of the festival, where dozens of movies are trying to get attention from distributors.

Some of this year's more talked-about titles, according to The Hollywood Reporter's film reporter Rebecca Ford, include the Iraq War drama "The Yellow Birds," the J.D. Salinger biopic "Rebel in the Rye," the dysfunctional family comedy "Landline" and the cross-cultural romance "The Big Sick."

"It's always hard to tell before the festival starts what will be the big breakout," Ford said.

Permut hopes "The Polka King" is a contender. The movie took three years to make, which is relatively fast, considering the average is seven years — and "Hacksaw Ridge" took 16 years to get made, he said.

It started when he saw a documentary, "The Man Who Would Be Polka King," about polka musician Jan Lewan and the massive Ponzi scheme that grew out of his attempts to keep his band and music career going.

"I think truth is stranger than fiction," Permut said. "I could never make up a movie like 'Polka King.' "

Permit acquired the story from the documentary makers and from Lewan and started making his pitch. He sent out two copies of the documentary — one to Red Hour Films, Ben Stiller's production company; the other to actor/comedian Jack Black.

"Jack saw it immediately. In a few days, I called him, and he said, 'I was born to play Jan Lewan,' " Permut said. Soon, Red Hour was on board, and Permut had hired the married filmmaking team of Maya Forbes and Wally Wolodarsky to write and direct the movie. (Forbes was at Sundance in 2014 with "Infinitely Polar Bear," and Wolodarsky, a former "Simpsons" writer, debuted "Coldblooded" at the festival in 1995.)

Cultivating talent like Forbes and Wolodarsky is another reason Permut comes to Sundance every year.

Back in 2009, Permut saw a comedy at Slamdance called "Punching the Clown," a semi-autobiographical story of a parody-song musician (played by Henry Phillips, who co-wrote the movie with director Gregori Viens). He signed Phillips and Viens to make a sequel, "Punching Henry," which features a slew of stand-up comics — Tig Notaro and Sarah Silverman among them — and will open Feb. 10 in 20 cities.

For another project, "Russ and Roger Go Beyond" — which tells the story of young Roger Ebert and his friendship with the exploitation-film legend Russ Meyer — Permut snagged another Sundance discovery to direct: Irish filmmaker John Carney, who made "Once" and "Sing Street."

"I'm always discovering gold nuggets," Permut said.

The dealmaking that goes on at Sundance every year is getting bigger, with new distribution outlets joining the traditional players, Permut said. Amazon, for example, picked up eight titles last year — including the Oscar-bound drama "Manchester by the Sea," which at $10 million was the year's second-biggest deal.

"Netflix and Amazon have been pretty aggressive at these festivals," said Ford, who added that she doesn't expect the $17.5 million level hit last year by Nate Parker's "The Birth of a Nation." "Everyone will be a little more conservative. It is a big risk to spend that much money on a film."

The fact that Parker's past — a rape allegation when he was in college — derailed the awards chances for "The Birth of a Nation" was likely a one-off situation, Ford said. Even so, she added, "maybe [a buyer] will Google a filmmaker before getting into a bidding war."

Fox Searchlight Pictures won the bidding war for "The Birth of a Nation," but Netflix had its influence. Reports at the time said the streaming service offered $20 million, but Parker and his people went for the smaller figure from Fox Searchlight to ensure a theatrical window.

Permut is OK with whoever buys his film, though his preference is toward bigger screens.

"I'm an old-school guy. I go to movie theaters to watch movies," he said. "I love the experience, the communal experience. But that's me."

Sean P. Means writes The Cricket in daily blog form at http://www.sltrib.com/blogs/moviecricket. Follow him on Twitter @moviecricket. Email him at spmeans@sltrib.com. How to Sundance

When • Thursday to Jan. 29

Where • Park City and venues in Salt Lake City and the Sundance resort in Provo Canyon.

Passes and ticket packages • On sale at sundance.org/festivals. Most are sold out, but some are still available.

Individual tickets • Tickets are $25 for the first half of the festival in Park City (Jan. 19-24), $20 for Salt Lake City screenings and for the second half in Park City (Jan. 25-29).

Information • sundance.org/festivals