Filmspotting Top 5: Director Departures

In what I hope becomes a weekly series here at The Ludovico Technique, I'm hoping to mirror (or rather copy) the excellent weekly podcast out of Chicago, Filmspotting, and doing my own Top 5 list in accordance to their designated topic. 
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Last week it was Top 5 Director Departures (in response to Kevin Smith directing "Red State") and thus, I'm here to provide my own list of five of the more unique, who-saw-that-coming directorial departures, so here we go:
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#5

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Alfonso Cuarón, "THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN" (2004)

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The Mexican-born director of "Y tu mamá también" certainly couldn't have been the obvious choice to adapt the third of J.K. Rowling's decidedly British mega-novels, yet the film is often cited as one of the best in the series. "Azkaban" was certainly a massive leap forward for the series, maturing the previous films' glittery, pre-pubescent messiness into the realm of the wicked.

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#4

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Joe Wright, "HANNA" (2011)

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The British prestige director, most noted for his costume dramas "Pride & Prejudice" and "Atonement" would seem to be the least likely candidate to have directed this (excuse my bluntness) badass action-film fable about a mysterious teenage girl (Saoirse Ronan) on the run from secret government organizations. The film bears Wright's trademark camerawork, yet its electro-pop soundtrack and idiosyncratic characters put Mr. Darcy firmly in its rear-view. 

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#3

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Robert Z. Leonard, "THE BRIBE" (1949)

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In perhaps the ultimate departure, one-man MGM musical factory Robert Z. Leonard directed this stylish, sleazy noir, the vastly underrated and underexposed "The Bribe". Considered a fairly substantial critical and commercial disappointment, the film, essentially a slip-shod 'B' movie at MGM, is surprisingly a rather brilliant and convoluted film noir with luscious atmosphere (it takes place in Central America) and a climactic shootout amidst a fireworks show that is quite the set-piece.

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#2 

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Frank Capra, "LOST HORIZON" (1937)

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I've never considered "Lost Horizon" to be an overwhelmingly terrific film, but I'm an absolute sucker for Golden Age meccas (that is, larger-than-life Hollywood productions) and Capra's "Lost Horizon" is not only a remarkably well-made super-sized epic (based on James Hilton's novel about a plane that crashes in a utopia in the Himalayas) but a rather stark contrast to the kind of idealistic social/political dramas that dominated Capra's filmography.

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#1

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Paul Thomas Anderson, "THERE WILL BE BLOOD"

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Ten years removed from his 70's porn odyssey, "Boogie Nights," Paul Thomas Anderson was at a creative crossroads, unsure what to do after his similarly unique career choice with 2003's "Punch-Drunk Love". 

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Settling on Upton Sinclair's novel "Oil!" as a source of inspiration and adaptation, Anderson loosely crafted a sprawling oil epic the likes of which no one could have anticipated. The film, which examines the ruthless Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) as he maliciously, uninhibitedly carves out a wealthy business in the California oil fields, is an American masterpiece about greed, corruption and the morally bankrupt pursuit of wealth and power.