So for the aspiring filmmakers who don't happen to have wealthy friends or connections at a studio, securing funding is by far the biggest obstacle between them and the fulfillment of their vision. Sometimes that means getting creative. Horribly, horribly creative.

Like it or not, film as an art form is all about money. Even a tiny independent film about a couple of dudes hanging around their apartment can cost more to make than an average waiter makes in a year.

5 Robert Rodriguez Paid for Movies With Medical Experiments

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You know director Robert Rodriguez from movies like Machete and Sin City, though he also finds time for family fare like the Spy Kids movies. But once upon a time (in the '90s), Rodriguez was an indie film hero for making El Mariachi. It was a microscopic budget film (made for as little as $7,000, reportedly) starring some dudes he knew and using every money-saving trick in the book. Rodriguez became an inspiration to every film student and video store clerk who dreamed of making a movie on their own terms, without having to sell out to The Man.

But how far did he have to go to scrape the cash together to make his little action movie? Let's put it this way: It involved letting people perform medical experiments on his body.

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"Take everything except my artistic integrity. And my penis."

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In his book Rebel Without a Crew, Rodriguez describes his life as a "human lab rat," signing up for several rounds of drug testing and medical studies to generate enough cash to fund his short films and eventually his first full-length feature. It started with a desperate Rodriguez looking through classified ads and seeing he could get a few thousand dollars for participating in a medical experiment and staying in a hospital for about a week. It's one of those things that seems too good to be true if you've never seen a horror movie.