Scott makes a great point too--one location is a huge timesaver. I imagine Buried didn't have too many set-building costs...

(Flipside to one location is you are under that much more pressure to make sure your story is REALLY entertaining, and REALLY should be in one location)

You'll want a centralized location, limited cast, and things like confined cameos so that you can hire a name for a day or two.

A million dollar film may shoot in as few as 12 days - many made for cable movies shoot with schedules like that - and DUEL was shot in 12 days. You may go up to 18 days - which is standard MOW schedule.

You want all of the money on the screen - and that means cast. Better to spend money on a star than on a leisurely schedule or an unplanned shoot.

Other stuff:
http://www.scriptsecrets.net/articles/indcormn.htm

Another element is what I call "dog juice" - you need the same entertainment value as that $100m film. So you do not want a bland script. Spanish films like REC and TIMECRIMES show you how to get a bunch of entertainment with central location and limited cast.

- Bill

I'd definitely say, limit your scene descriptions. Don't mention props or wardrobe.

Select outdoor scenes that limit background. Stay out of cars entirely if possible.

Fortunately there are a lot of Photoshop tricks with composites that let you replace backgrounds, remove unwanted objects, etc so if you think about the execution - i.e. filming, editing and the tools you have you can make things seem bigger than they are.

I'm Co-Producing a short I wrote and props can add up.

$1M is plenty if you spend the money wisely. Most of what we're spending is on location and equipment.

Agreed on all counts.

I'd add night exteriors as something to avoid at all costs unless it's absolutely necessary, or you've got something spectacular happening in the scene. A script completely devoid of night scenes will probably look sort of odd when it's filmed (do all the characters go to sleep at 4 PM?), but I'd definitely be aware of how many are popping up--they can get really expensive to shoot, and they're always more time consuming than you want them to be.