I like foreign and independent type movies or most movies that are just different and/or don't necessarily have the typical US happy ending. Sex and violence generally don't bother me.

Also, since I often don't have a lot of time to actually watch the movies, if anyone knows of any good shorter length movies, that would be great too.

Thanks.

Run Lola Run
Intermission
Les Vacances des M. Hulot
Kagemusha
Ran
Seven Samurai
Oldboy
Akira (this one's animated but as eye candy.... wow)
Brazil (but get the director's cut!)
Italian for Beginners
Belle du Jour
La Femme Nikita
Killing Zoe

I've got a few more recommendations but that should keep you busy for a bit. ;-)

Kinamand (Chinaman). Netflix description:
In this poignant Danish tale, hapless plumber Keld (Bjarne Henriksen) finds his world crumbling when his wife of 25 years (Charlotte Fich) walks out on him. The dejected Keld soon falls into a routine of eating at the neighborhood Chinese grill, where he befriends the owner -- who offers Keld a sizable sum to wed the restaurateur's sister (Vivian Wu) in a marriage of convenience.

Also, the Snow Walker
Description, from Netflix,
Charles Martin Smith helms this survivalist adventure tale starring Barry Pepper as cocky, hotheaded bush pilot Charlie Halliday. During a routine stop on a supply run in Canada's Northwest Territories, Charlie agrees to transport a critically ill Inuit woman (Annabella Piugattuk) to a Yellowknife hospital. But the plane goes down in the Arctic tundra, leaving the twosome marooned -- and facing the brutality of the looming northern winter.

One more,
The Butterfly
All Julien (Michel Serrault) wants to do in his old age is collect and preserve butterflies. But when a woman (Nade Dieu) and her 8-year-old daughter Elsa (Claire Bouanich) take residence in his building, his world opens up for good. Young Elsa befriends Julien and sneakily joins him on a trip to the Alps to find a rare butterfly specimen. During this getaway, their touching intergenerational bond deepens in this family-friendly French film.

And another, The Girl From Paris, a top favorite,
Netflix:
Fed up with city life, Sandrine (Mathilde Seigner) decides to leave Paris and live out her dream of becoming a farmer. It's love at first sight when she comes across a farmstead on the Vercors plateau, which she takes over from the cantankerous farming veteran Adrien (Michel Serrault). Sandrine is as confident she can run the farm by herself as Adrien is skeptical; the trials of the oncoming winter will prove them both wrong.

Have fun!
Kathy

Wild Strawberries (Ingmar Bergman, dir.)
Jules and Jim (Truffaut, dir.)[love triangle in WW II]
Antonia's Line
The Return (Russian)
Zelary
Run, Lola, Run ( a must-see!)
Blow-up (English)
A Very Long Engagement (French)
The Last Metro (French)
The Return of Martin Guerre (French)
Burnt by the Sun (Russian and powerful, unforgettable)
Au Revoir, Mes Enfants (Goodbye, Children) [true story of hiding Jewish children in WWII]
Life is Beautiful
Whale Rider (set in New Zealand)
Rabbit-proof Fence
Fanny and Alexander (classic story dir. I. Bergman)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Empire of the Sun (WW II, Eng.)
Cinema Paradiso (Italian)

That's only for starters!

Oh, and I'm not totally against American made films...just don't usually like the predictable happy ending stuff. I love stuff live Donnie Darko... so if you have any unique and sort of unknown American movies that you think I may not have seen, please share...although I seem to have more than enough in my queue for quite a while now! Can't wait to have the time to watch them.

THANKS AGAIN!

Blue Velvet
Mulholland Drive (both David Lynch dir.)
Memento
Closer (well maybe this one is English)

Starring Christian Bale. About a man who hasn't slept for a year. Bale lost 63 pounds for this film and is disturbingly thin. He plays a sleep deprived machine operator who makes a tragic mistake at his workplace.

***

The Station Agent ... USA 2003

I loved this film!
Stars Peter Dinklage (he was in last season's Nip/Tuck) as Fin, a dwarf train-aficionado who inherits a train station when a friend dies and leaves it to him in his will. There he befriends Joe (Bobby Cannavale), a Cuban-American lunch truck vendor; and Olivia (Patricia Clarkson), a middle-aged woman grieving the loss of her child.

Jodi-

Bagdad Cafe - My alltime favorite. How much the people we
meet can change our lives.

Dead Man - Johnny Depp & Jim Jarmusch, what a combo!

A Slipping Down Life - A touching, quirky, little romance
with Guy Pearce & Lili Taylor.

The French trilogy: Red, White, and Blue

Also: Europa, Europa.

(Woodnymph, nice to see Antonia's Line on your list. I've only seen it once and really liked it; didn't realize it was now out on DVD. I just put it in my movie queue.)

They do definitely seem to be the type of movie I am after since the ones I have seen that you mentioned I have really enjoyed..The Machinist, Bagdad Cafe, Station Agent, Closer, etc... were all very, very good movies, IMHO. Thanks again for your suggestions. I hope this post helps out some other forum members/lurkers too.