I don’t know about you, but I’ve got a long list of movies to watch, and it keeps growing.  Most of them are “classics” and other well-regarded films that I have yet to catch, but I love being surprised by movies.  When you have no expectations going into a movie, a high quality film that you took a gamble on can feel like an unexpected reward, a prize for taking a chance.  Here are 10 movies that I went into knowing little about, and came away with surprising dividends.  They still fly below the radar, so you probably haven’t seen them either, but I think they deserve way more recognition.

A Face in the Crowd (1957)
Directed by Elia Kazan

Continuing Elia Kazan’s fascination with men in low places and how much of their soul they are willing to trade for a change in station, this is one of the most prescient movies of the 1950s, dealing with the rising powers of television and celebrity, and how that power can be used and abused.  Starring a never-better Andy Griffith as a hobo songster turned radio-then-television star, his growing popularity and fame strip the charisma away to reveal the greedy, deluded, insecure man inside.  Think Citizen Kane all covered in sawmill gravy.

The Frisco Kid (1979)
Directed by Robert Aldrich

“That’s a Movie?!?!”, Entry #1: A Polish rabbi, played by Gene Wilder, makes his way through the wild west, with Harrison Ford as his guide.  They rob banks, get chased down by a posse, freeze in the mountains, have some shootouts, and even get captured by Native Americans, who they teach to dance!  Yep, that’s a movie, and it’s awesome.

In Bruges (2008)
Directed by Martin McDonagh

Some people (and understandably so) complain that the films of Quentin Tarantino and Guy Ritchie, while delightfully stylized and thrilling, can lack any emotional resonance.  McDonagh’s story of British mobsters (Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleason, both excellent) hiding out in the titular Belgian city, is exactly what those people are looking for.  It maintains the action and humor of the other films, while adding ruminations on guilt and repentance.  It’s the type of film that contains both allusions to purgatorial artwork and midget jokes.

Joyeux Noël (2005)
Directed by Christian Carion

A Christmas movie that even this Jew can love!  This movie creates a narrative out of the various occurrences of fraternization in the trenches of World War I during the Christmas of 1914.  Like most holiday films, it can be a tad hokey and big with its emotions, but contrasted against the horrors of trench warfare, it is also very affecting, both in small moments, like the reunion between a husband and wife separated by the war, and in grandiose ones, like a chorus of Silent Night springing up across the no-man’s-land between enemy trenches.

Miller’s Crossing (1990)
Directed by Joel Coen

I guess no one can consider the Coen Brothers as flying under the radar, at least not for true movie buffs, but this is one of their often over-looked early masterpieces.  Starring Gabriel Byrne and Albert Finney as long time friends and gangsters at odds over a woman (Marcia Gay Harden), it combines the masterful plotting, complex characters and twists and turns of their best thrillers with moments as surreal, wacky and stylized as their finest comedies, it is one of the best gangster movies of the past 20 years.  You will never be able to listen to the song “Danny Boy” the same ever again.

Moon (2009)
Directed by Duncan Jones

The newest film on this list, this is another in a long line of sci-fi/psychological thrillers.  (Another, Danny Boyle’s Sunshine, just missed this list’s cutoff.)  In the sterile style of 2001 and Solaris, this is the story of a man (Sam Rockwell) at the end of a three year contract working solo harvesting energy on the moon, with only a benevolent HAL-style robot, voiced by Kevin Spacey, to keep him company.  Aside from that, the less said about the plot, the better.  Dealing with issues of identity and Cronenberg-style body-horror, this movie takes many familiar sci-fi tropes and mixes them together (and sometimes subverts them) in new and creative ways.

The Proposition (2005)
Directed by John Hillcoat

From a script by musician Nick Cave (who also wrote the excellent score) and a cast of great character actors (Guy Pearce, Ray Winstone, Danny Huston, John Hurt and Emily Watson), this is a bleak and bloody Western.  Set in the frontier of late 1800′s Australia, Pearce plays an outlaw forced to hunt the wilderness to find and kill his brother, an even more ruthless killer (Huston).

Shotgun Stories (2007)
Directed by Jeff Nichols

Hands down, the “smallest” movie on this list.  The story of a family feud that erupts in a small Arkansas town between two sets of brothers who share a father.  His sons from his first marriage (named Son, Boy and Kid) show up at his funeral and make some remarks that don’t sit too well with the children from his later marriage, who knew him as a father that was at least sober and present enough to give them actual names.  The feud slowly builds to a feverish level, but the movie never escalates to a point that it feels contrived or unrealistic.  Everything, from the lower-class trappings to the familial relationships feel almost documentary-real.  An excellent soundtrack from Ben Nichols, brother of the director and lead singer of southern rock band Lucero.

Spartan (2004)
Directed by David Mamet

Envision a version of 24 or one of the Bourne movies with a slightly more realistic take, and protagonist that’s not quite a super hero, and you’ve got Spartan.  Val Kilmer plays a member of Special Ops brought in to help find the President’s missing daughter.  The movie keeps its focus on Kilmer and the investigation, and doesn’t get distracted by the political machinations going on in the background.  It’s main concern, as noted through the movie’s oft-repeated mantra, is “Where’s the girl?”  Solid performances all around, with Mamet’s signature tight, twisting plot and colorful, terse dialogue.

Time After Time (1979)
Directed by Nicholas Meyer

“That’s a Movie?!?!”, Entry #2: H.G. Welles (Malcolm McDowell) chases Jack the Ripper to 20th century San Francisco.  Best watched late at night, it’s way smarter than it sounds, but no less fun.  Yep, that’s a movie, and it is awesome.

So what other great, unsung movies did I miss?  I love going off the beaten path of most “best” movie lists.   I’d love to hear some of your suggestions.

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