10 Movies That Did Crazy Things When They Ran Out Of Money

hello all of you beautiful people jules

here for whatculture.com and you know

what making a movie even a terrible one

is incredibly difficult and of the many

many things that can go wrong there's

always just the possibility that you'll

just run out of money and when that

happened for these films they took some

rather outlandish routes to get back on

track so let's take a look at them as

i'm jules this is what culture.com and

these are 10 movies that did crazy

things when they ran out of money number

10. director renny harlan spent 1

million dollars of his own money to fix

the script cutthroat island films don't

get much more calamitous than cutthroat

island the 1995 action-adventure film

that bombed so catastrophically at the

box office that it put studios off

swashbuckling movies for almost an

entire decade that was until pirates of

the caribbean reaffirmed their

commercial viability the production was

beset by numerous delays and onset

accidents which caused the budget to

balloon to a ludicrous 98 million

dollars by the time it was all said and

done though some estimates even peg it

as high as 115 million dollars

furthermore the scripts just wasn't

working during pre-production and though

renny harlan asked the producers to

bankroll rewrites production company

carol cole pictures was on the verge of

bankruptcy and had no further funds to

give as a result a desperate harlan

ended up spending one million dollars of

his own cash to pay the writers to

complete a new draft even though harlan

was a rising superstar director after

the success of die hard 2 and

cliffhanger that was still a majorly

drastic move for any filmmaker and it

was ultimately all for naught the film

was critically panned with particular

attention paid to its shoddy screenplay

while harlan received a worse director

razzie nomination and it grossed a

brutal 10 million dollars worldwide 9.

robert rodriguez kept bloopers in the

film because he couldn't afford multiple

takes el mariachi robert rodriguez wrote

the book on how to produce an ultra low

budget movie quite literally in fact

because he chronicled the production of

his filmmaking debut l mariachi in the

much-loved 1992 tome rebel without a

crew or how a 23 year old filmmaker with

seven thousand dollars became a

hollywood player indeed rodriguez

produced his entire indie western for

barely seven thousand dollars much of

which he raised by participating in

experimental drug trials using every

corner cutting trick possible to ensure

that he didn't run over budget because

well he literally had no other option

rodriguez borrowed a 60 millimeter

camera shot every scene in just one or

two takes edited on video to save money

and used real guns because he couldn't

afford prop ones as well as having his

cast also double as crew members the

budget was so razor thin that if the

maximum two takes of a single setup were

blown by mistakes he would simply

incorporate the goofs into the story or

cut to the next setup as soon as

possible hence the film's oft choppy

editing style and yet despite being so

blatantly held together with duct tape

and sheer can do spirit el mariachi's

feverish charm and energy endeared

itself to critics and indie film fans

launching rodriguez's hollywood career

in the process number eight director

george slicer borrowed money from the

french mob the vanishing 1988. 1988

dutch horror masterpiece to vanishing is

a film of such composed confidence that

it feels like every aspect of the

production went exactly as filmmaker

george slicer originally planned and yet

the film was reportedly made for a

budget of just 165 000 which was so

scant it wasn't even enough to feed the

cast and crew through to the end of

shooting according to the director he

ended up paying a visit to some shady

figures from the french criminal

underworld and asked them for a loan the

mobsters complied but also assured the

filmmaker of the dire consequences if he

couldn't settle his debt as agreed

slicer didn't elaborate on how it all

shook out but given that the film was a

considerable critical and commercial

success and he lived for another 25

years seemingly free of mob hassle the

gamble evidently paid off

7. william shatner recycled footage

extras and costumes star trek 5 the

final frontier star trek 5 the final

frontier is generally accepted to be the

worst of all the trek movies it's a bit

of a boar for the most part and lacks

the glossy big budget feel of its

predecessors despite having a markedly

bigger budget than the three prior

sequels the william shatner directed

project was a massive challenge for all

involved there was considerable

pre-production squabbling over the

script shatner wrestled with paramount

over the budget there was a writer's

guild strike going on and there were

major issues while shooting on location

and during post-production because

shatner's budget was revised and by his

own claim he didn't receive enough help

to correctly allocate his allotted money

he had to cut corners at almost every

turn to bring it on budget this included

reusing the same extras in different

camera setups to imply cybox ability was

larger recycling costumes from previous

track films and filming the campfire

scenes closer up because there wasn't

time or money to build more expansive

sets for wide shots worst of all the

film's climax was originally intended to

have kirk be chased by a fleet of rock

monsters but when there simply wasn't

the money to pull it off and a single

rock monster test scene wasn't

satisfactory shatner was out of options

as a result he ended up reusing

previously shot footage of god for the

climax who manifests and attempts to

kill kirk only to be blown to

smithereens by klingon disrupter fire as

much stick as shatner gets for this

movie it really does seem like he tried

to make the best of a rather terrible

situation number six orson welles set a

scene in a turkish bath so he didn't

need costumes othello 1951 though orson

welles might be remembered as a staunch

perfectionist he also rolled with the

punches when necessary as he proved

beyond any and all doubt while he was

filming his 1951 adaptation of

shakespeare's othello the film was

ultimately shot over the period of three

years initially being shut down after

the original producer announced

bankruptcy mere days into shooting wells

decided to salvage the film by funding

it himself but due to the massive costs

involved he had to intermittently shoot

between acting projects which he was

using to bankroll production filming was

stopped at least three times during one

of the shooting cycles wells ran so

drive money that the costumes being used

for the film had to be impounded due to

unpaid fees unable to deal with costly

delays by sourcing new costumes wells

had a rather ingenious light bulb idea

for shooting an upcoming murder scene

wells decided to change the setting to a

turkish bath because this would provide

a logical reason for the characters not

being in their typical mode of attire

allowing him to keep filming despite the

wardrobe being actually locked in

storage this is just one of the

solutions that wells found to combat his

bleeding budget but it's by far the most

impressively creative number five the

python team came up with the fourth wall

breaking ending monty python and the

holy grail monty python and the holy

grail ends in rather hilariously surreal

fashion as the army of knights prepares

to assault the french soldiers only for

modern day police to arrive out of

nowhere arrest king arthur and bedevier

and break the camera it truly feels that

the film couldn't have ended any other

way and yet the python team have

confirmed numerous times over the years

that an original scripted climax

involved the actual battle that was set

up in those final moments allegedly due

to how much money had been spent on

pyrotechnics for tim the enchanter's

scene there just wasn't enough money

left to stage and shoot a battle in

earnest and so this fourth wall breaking

ending was dreamt up instead co-star

michael palin quite aptly called the

ultimate ending both cheaper and funnier

this approach wouldn't work for more

straight-laced movies but something as

willfully farcical as monty python well

it absolutely did work number four spike

lee gave up most of his fee and asked

black celebrities for donations malcolm

x spike lee's malcolm x ended up costing

35 million dollars which was almost as

expensive as lee's five previous films

combined even with the epic biopic lee

was trying to make some pushback from

warner brothers wasn't entirely

unreasonable who had reservations about

the 30 million dollars that lee asked

for and also demands of a three-hour run

time lee was nevertheless allowed to

begin filming with 28 million dollars as

a budget and convinced warner brothers

to raise it to 33 million during

shooting but as lee continued to shoot

and found himself unable to get any more

money from the studio he decided to

surrender two million dollars of his own

three million dollar salary to the

budget after four months of shooting

were completed the insurance company

took control of the film and amid run

time arguments between lee and the

studio shut down post-production with

the costs running dry lee got desperate

and made the highly unconventional

decision to effectively crowdfund

post-production from prominent black

celebrities including bill cosby oprah

winfrey michael jordan magic johnson

janet jackson and prince these donations

not investments lee made clear allowed

lee to get back into the editing suite

and finish the 201 minute cut that he

envisioned from the outset though

malcolm x was a modest commercial

success and netted denzel washington a

best actor oscar nomination lee's

unconventional chicanery soured his

relationship with warner brothers for

years such that he was prevented from

helping develop space jam number three

planned sets were replaced with

cardboard cutouts the adventures of

baron munchausen terry gillum strikes

again this time not in a 400 000 monty

python film but the

46.63 million dollar 1988 fantasy flick

the adventures of baron munchausen

incredibly the project was originally

budgeted at 23.5 million which ballooned

to roughly double that by the end of

production a figure which gillum

predictably disputes whatever the true

price tag plans to build a moon city set

at pinewood studios were scrapped

because there literally wasn't the money

to create them gillum ever a man to

thrive under pressure decided instead to

have the concept sketches of the city

enlarged printed and stuck to giant

plywood boards which were then moved

around by crew hands as necessary to

imply movement and scale and so when the

baron and sally arrive at the city it

has a really weird surreal 2d aesthetic

which rather than suggest budgetary

constraints feels totally on brand for

gillum's madcap vision though the film

was ultimately a massive commercial

failure grossing barely eight million

dollars globally it was at least

nominated for four oscars including best

art direction and best visual effects

number two the casting crew took out

high interest bank loans and begged

local businesses to help the evil dead

it isn't a secret to anyone that sam

raimi's the evil dead was a seat of the

pants production where he and his

inexperienced cast and crew run every

last penny out of their 375 000 budget

halfway through filming in the winter of

1980 raymie actually ran out of money

and so in order to restart shooting

raymie his producer and star bruce

campbell committed themselves to doing

whatever it took to find the extra funds

between them they took out high interest

bank loans borrowed money from friends

and families and even cold called local

businesses around michigan begging for

catering resources gasoline and all of

the other logistical accoutrements are

film production needs these risky

gambles all paid off as the evil dead

was a phenomenal commercial success that

launched an entire horror empire that is

still thriving today and number one the

second unit was sent home early masters

of the universe production on 1987's

live-action he-man movie masters of the

universe was an utter mess it was by far

the most expensive film ever produced by

the canon group at the time and they

were desperate enough for a smash hit

after a string of flops that eventually

added seven million dollars to the

superheroes flicks budget bringing it to

a hefty 22 million dollars nevertheless

canon were obsessed with cutting

budgetary corners wherever possible

scrapping planned sequences and at one

point even dismissing the film's entire

second unit team though the film does

have a credited second unit canon

executives sent them home during filming

rather than pay them to complete pickups

insisting instead the director gary

goddard carry out any additional

photography that is establishing shots

and prop close-ups by himself it really

sounds like this is a case of putting a

band-aid on a gaping wound though given

that the production clearly had so many

other issues its script being won the

film's commercial failure along with

those of superman 4 the quest for peace

and life force ultimately contributed to

canon film's eventual closure