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

Ralph Bakshi's 1978 animated adaptation of The Lord of the Rings was originally intended to be a trilogy, with one film planned for each of J.R.R. Tolkien's three novels.

Yet budgetary limitations resulted in studio United Artists condensing the three books into two movies, with the first film adapting all of The Fellowship of the Ring and half of The Two Towers.

Bakshi produced the film for just $4 million, which combined with the movie's pricey and time-consuming rotoscoped animation - where live-action frames are traced over - made it a stressful project for the filmmaker.

Furthermore, the studio made the ill-advised decision to remove "Part 1" from the title, ensuring audiences who expected to see a full adaptation of Tolkien's trilogy were left bitterly disappointed by seeing only half the story.

And to make matters worse, despite the film turning a hefty profit, disagreements between Bakshi and United Artists led to Part 2 never being made.

There's a distinct irony that Bakshi only ever got to tell half the story while Peter Jackson had the opposite "problem" on The Hobbit films, being given way too much freeway, telling a simple, single-volume story across three bloated blockbusters.