The 8 Best Movies of 2006, Ranked

2006 was stacked. Bond got good again, Scorsese went to Boston, and a $2M German movie quietly beat them both. Ranked by the movie.guru score.

Number one beats Scorsese and Bond without a word of English.

1. 8
   The Illusionist (2006)7.8

   A magic movie that's fun, but you'll clock the trick.

   Reported $16.5M budget, $87.9M worldwide. Audiences beat 85% of movies, critics only 63%. Guru's Take is 6.8, because Norton is acting in a moodier movie than the script.
2. 7
   Blood Diamond (2006)7.9

   Djimon Hounsou carries this. DiCaprio's accent just rides along.

   Critics shrugged with 64% on Rotten Tomatoes. Audiences beat 95% of movies and gave it an 8.0 on IMDb. The crowd is right, mostly because of Hounsou.
3. 6
   Borat! Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006)8.5

   The funniest movie of 2006 is also its most uncomfortable.

   A reported $18M budget turned into $262.6M worldwide. Metacritic gave it an 89, the exact same as The Lives of Others. Let that sit for a second.
4. 5
   Casino Royale (2006)8.7

   The best Bond movie ever made, and it's not close.

   $606.3M worldwide, 94% on Rotten Tomatoes, and Mads Mikkelsen made a card game scarier than any laser. Guru's Take is 8.8, higher than its own score.
5. 4
   The Departed (2006)9.0

   Jack Nicholson ate this whole movie, scenery included.

   1,585,737 IMDb votes, more than double most of this list. $292.1M worldwide on a reported $90M. Mark Wahlberg gets the best lines and absolutely knows it.
6. 3
   Little Miss Sunshine (2006)9.1

   A broken yellow van beat a Bond movie. Correctly.

   Made for a reported $8M, grossed $100.5M worldwide, and audiences beat 95% of movies. Steve Carell played sad before playing sad was cool.
7. 2
   The Lives of Others (2006)9.6

   The best thriller of 2006 is a man wearing headphones.

   Audiences beat 100% of movies. Not a typo. Made for a reported $2M, and Ulrich Mühe does more with a blank stare than most casts do with explosions.
8. 1
   Pan's Labyrinth (2006)9.6

   Better than The Departed. Better than Bond. Fight me.

   Metacritic 98, the highest on this list by nine points. Guru's Take 9.5. Doug Jones in prosthetics is terrifying, and Sergi López is somehow worse.

$281.57 says someone in the comments types "where's The Prestige" within four minutes.

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Current mood: ready to fight about it