Ann Thompson is reporting that Fox Searchlight has bought Sundance audience fave Once. The no-budget Irish musical (it was made for a reported $100,000) features members of the band The Frames, which director John Carney played bass in in the early ’90s.

From a Gregg Goldstein interview with Carney contained within Thompson’s piece:

Carney, meanwhile, had music junkies in mind when he made his film Once. “I wanted to create a visual album, something you could watch over and over again,” he said. In the process, the filmmaker created one of the most unique musicals in recent memory, telling the story of a Dublin street busker (Glen Hansard) and an aspiring Czech musician (Marketa Irglova) whose evolving romance is communicated in the film through the songs they sing, share and compose together.