Speaking of Tarantino and low budgets, Tarantino apprentice (I say this tongue-in-cheek) Robert Rodriguez did his first feature film El Mariachi on a $10k budget.
I distinctly recall that he for instance had only one guitar case on hand, so if you pay close attention, you'll notice that our protagonist (an innocent mariachi with a guitar in his case) and the bad guys chasing him (sporting lots of guns in their case) use the same guitar case! Now that's props on the cheap...
The director's commentary on the DVD is amazing, because it's mostly about all the shortcuts taken to get the film made. Most of the extras are people who provided locations in exchange for appearing in the film. There are short loops of frames of gunfire because they didn't have the right kind guns to film automatic fire with blanks. And so on.
I should be noted that the only way to keep budgets that low is if most people in front of and behind the camera work for free. This is in no way sustainable in a professional industry.
I distinctly recall that he for instance had only one guitar case on hand, so if you pay close attention, you'll notice that our protagonist (an innocent mariachi with a guitar in his case) and the bad guys chasing him (sporting lots of guns in their case) use the same guitar case! Now that's props on the cheap...