There are many kinds of movies but not so many kinds of hits. The one with which audiences are most familiar is the mass-marketed, studio-backed juggernaut that opens on thousands of screens at once, thereby not only becoming the only film anyone wants to see that weekend but pretty much the only one they can see. Thus did The Dark Knight charge through the summer like a runaway cement truck.

Then there’s the slow-­building sleeper, built up bit by bit, city by city, via platform release. This was the preferred methodology of mini-majors like Paramount Vantage and Warner Independent Pictures, though those companies’ recent demise had a lot to do with many of their most promising wares’ inability to get any traction despite decent reviews, award nominations and healthy per-screen box-office averages at big-city arty-plexes.

In the case of Tell No One, we have something far more special: the fluke. A twisty, madly entertaining thriller about a man’s discovery of the true details of his wife’s murder eight years before, this French feature first emerged as a hit at home over two years ago, ultimately winning four Césars, including a best director award for actor-turned-filmmaker Guillaume Canet. (A major star in France, he’s best known to North-American audiences for his lead role in the 2005 World War I drama Joyeux Noël and as Leonardo DeCaprio’s buddy in The Beach.)

Though its UK success suggested that it might have legs in other anglophone territories, a small Chicago indie distributor named Music Box Films was the only one willing to have a go at pitching Tell No One to American audiences. Since its release in July, it has quietly grossed over $5 million based largely on enthusiastic notices and good, old-fashioned word of mouth. Meanwhile, in Canada, Seville released the movie in Quebec in 2007 before putting it out on DVD. Though it’s been available in Toronto video shops for over a year, it’s only now getting a theatrical run.

In retrospect, Tell No One’s triumphant transatlantic crossing doesn’t seem so far-fetched — after all, many Americans were familiar with the material already, Canet having based his film on a bestseller by New Jersey–based crime writer Harlan Coben. Though liberties have been taken in order to move its setting from Manhattan to Paris, Canet’s movie otherwise hews closely to the novel’s contours, beginning with an intentionally sketchy rendering of the lakeside attack that cost Alexandre (François Cluzet) his beloved wife Margot (Marie-Josée Croze). The action then moves forward eight years, as the still grief-stricken pediatrician is enmeshed in unanswered questions about the crime, including how it is that Margot is now sending him emails.

Tell No One benefits greatly from its unusual mix of continental and Yankee sensibilities. While the Parisian context and the strong, naturalistic performances by the star-heavy French cast give Tell No One the feel and appearance of a classy Gallic import, its relentless momentum and knotty plotting give it a heart of pure pulp. If Truffaut had lived long enough to do a Dean Koontz adaptation, it might have played like this.

But perhaps the biggest reason it’s struck a chord with audiences on this continent is that it’s so obviously superior to the adult-marketed thrillers that Hollywood has to offer. Compared to the likes of Premonition, Fracture and Untraceable, Tell No One shines harder than it ought to given that it qualifies as exceptionally good trash rather than great art. Indeed, its success points to how starved movie audiences have become for a sufficiently compelling, well-crafted and non-idiotic piece of entertainment.

Much to his credit, Canet understands that a suspenseful scene — such as a centrepiece foot chase that’s a small miracle of economy and ingenuity — has far more power when viewers have a chance to know and possibly even like the people on screen. The superb quality of the performances across the board has everything to do with that. Along with Cluzet’s vigorous showing as our perplexed yet intrepid hero, we’re rewarded with memorable turns by Croze (who’s had great success in France since departing her native Montreal), Kristin Scott-Thomas as Alexandre’s snarky sister-in-law, Nathalie Baye as his steely lawyer and François Berléand as the detective who’s equally determined to discover the truth about Margot’s fate. That this cop takes advantage of a lull during a manhunt by delivering groceries to his elderly mother is but one example of Canet’s willingness to deviate from the tired template of the contemporary thriller.

At the same time, the film has such a strong sense of clarity, confidence and drive that it rarely stumbles under the weight of a plotline so bogglingly complex, it takes a good 20 minutes for the characters to explain it to each other.

Movie-biz analysts have been working nearly as hard to explain the factors leading up to Tell No One’s breakthrough success. But maybe it’s best interpreted as a rare case of not just giving people what they like already but doing it with a panache that reminds them what they want from movies in the first place.