The term "independent film" gets tossed around quite liberally these days. When mainstream audiences hear it, they think of people like Quentin Tarantino or production companies like A24 and Blumhouse Productions. But Tarantino s latest flick had a budget of over $90 million, a far stretch from what you d imagine an indie film to be. You can even tune into the Independent Spirit Awards, the awards show representing the little guy, and see a sea of Hollywood A-listers with independent artists sprinkled in for good measure. And over the past decade or so there s been a lot of crossover with films being nominated for both the Indie Spirit Awards and the Academy Awards, the biggest award show of the year. (To be fair, over the past year the Indie Spirit Awards have started going back to their roots and championing smaller, lesser-known films.)