2006 Movies Ranked

<< 2005     2007 >>

2006 was a great year for movies.  In fact, my taste in moves matured significantly during this period (the previous year I had though Revenge of the Sith was one of the best movies ever made).  I know it was a good year because the movie that won the Academy Award for Best Picture was, as usual, less deserving than many films that didn’t even get nominated, and it still a movie I actually liked.  Ironically, Pixar didn’t make a great movie this year.



32. The Da Vinci Code

D: Ron Howard

**********

Offensive, ignorant, insulting and, above all, boring.

31. Beerfest

D: Jay Chandrasekhar

**********

An extremely bad comedy with very few funny moments (eg: “The Eye of the Jew”).  I was particularly offended by the tasteless jokes about the dead character’s twin brother being a perfect replacement for him. 

30. Eragon

D: Stefen Fangmeier

**********

A bland Star Wars rip-off with the most blandly angelic horsemouthed dragon I’ve ever seen.  Why can’t Jeremy Irons ever be in a good fantasy movie?

29. Pokemon Ranger and the Temple of the Sea

D: Kunihiko Yuyama

**********

One of the more boring Pokemon movies I sat through.  It does have some nice scenery and a memorably goofy villain.  Seriously, this guy is a freakin’ cereal mascot.

28. Miami Vice

D: Michael Mann

**********

Incredibly dull movie in which the two leads have no chemistry whatsoever.  Mostly unwatchable except for some excellent gunfights (it is a Michael Mann movie) and an awesome moment from Det. Gina Calabrese.

27. X-Men: The Last Stand

D: Brett Ratner

**********

At least Kelsey Grammer was a great Beast.

26. Rescue Dawn

D: Werner Herzog

**********

This was my first experience with Werner Herzog, and it wasn’t very good.  Herzog is highly respected, but this movie is just an inaccurate, by-the-numbers war movie complete with the typical Hollywood historical slander for “dramatic effect.”

25. 300

D: Zack Snyder

**********

This tasteless movie would have been a great addition to the 2007 list if not for this film festival.  This movie was like watching one of those racist World War II propaganda cartoons, except with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck replaced by male strippers.  Ideologically wrongheaded, tacky and very poorly framed.  The protagonists are hardly well-developed, let alone worth rooting for, and whatever potential it has as a guilty pleasure is ruined by the sporadic slow-motion, which robs the action scenes of any energy or consistent tone.  At least the score is fun to listen to.  

24. Nacho Libre

D: Jared Hess

**********

It starred Jack Black. It was from the writer of School of Rock and the director of Napoleon Dynamite.  This should have been funny, but it wasn’t.  It also has the dubious distinction of having the worst fart joke I have ever seen.

23. Cars

D: John Lasseter

**********

2006 may have been a strong year for movies in general, but not for animated ones.  After all, this year gave us Pixar’s most underwhelming movie.  In fact, I’m pretty sure Happy Feet won Best Animated Picture by default.

22. Annapolis

D: Justin Lin

**********

Academy people assure me it’s wildly inaccurate.  I do know that the Academy refused to endorse the movie, so it was filmed on a completely different campus.  For most people, it would just be a generic coming-of-age movie.  I did, however, like the “You’re my Mississippi” line.

21. Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes Christmas Carol
D: Charles Visser
**********
Unfaithful and not that funny.
 

20. Underworld Evolution

D: Len Wiseman

**********

A slight improvement over the original, but that’s not saying much.

  

19. The Wicker Man

D: Neil LaBute

**********

Unintentional hilarity.

18. Apocalypto
D: Mel Gibson
**********
South Park is right.  Mel Gibson may be an Anti-Semitic psycho, but he does know how to make a movie.


17. Idiocracy

D: Mike Judge

**********

16. Borat

D: Larry Charles

**********

Sacha Baron Cohen does a good job of exposing the embarrassing ignorance of (a few cherry-picked) Americans.  I don’t think it’s aged quite so well though.  The satire is not as definitive as the makers hope, the movie has spawned some annoying memes, and the impact of the shock humor has worn a bit.  Still, it’s a very funny movie.

15. Mission: Impossible III
D: J.J. Abrams
**********

A lot of people seemed to hate this movie, but I found it to be a clever, solid addition to the series.

14. United 93

D: Paul Greengrass

**********

Though it was released questionably soon after 9/11, this movie is a visceral depiction of the attack and the brave sacrifice of those on this plane. 

13. Stranger Than Fiction

D: Marc Forster

**********

One of the few instances where Will Ferrell plays a normal person, and the results are pretty good.

12. The Departed

D: Martin Scorsese

**********

Okay, I’m going to put this out: I’m not the biggest fan of Martin Scorsese movies.  Everyone else thinks they’re masterpieces, but I generally see them as mildly amusing films about criminals who beat each other up and say bad words.  Outside of that, they don’t do much for me.  The difference here is that this is a very amusing movie about criminals who beat each other up and say bad words.

11. Talledega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby

D: Adam McKay

**********

I thought this movie was hilarious, which is ironic because I absolutely hated Anchorman.

10. The Lives of Others

D:Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck

**********

Though some argued that this movie about Communist oppression in East Germany stole the Best Foreign Language Oscar from Pan's Labyrinth, it's still a very good movie.

9. The Prestige

D: Christopher Nolan

**********

Great style and a mysterious plot, one of the many examples of why I love this director.

8. Pan’s Labyrinth

D: Guillermo del Toro

**********

A movie that combines the cruelty of the real world with a wonderful, and sometimes frightening, fantasy world.  Guillermo del Toro’s distinct visual style is very beautiful in this film.

7. V for Vendetta

D: Brian McTeigue

**********

Though hated by many conservatives and fans of the comic, I very much enjoyed it.  The only things it was really liberal on were gay rights and opposition to the Bush administration, issues I’m actually more on the liberal side of, anyway.  The acting and action were very fun, too.

6. Lucky Number Slevin

D: Paul McGuigan

**********

An extremely inventive mystery movie with a great twist.  For some reason critics thought it was some sort of Pulp Fiction rip-off, but, then again, they always seem to have a shallow definition of what a rip-off is.

5. A Scanner Darkly

D: Richard Linklater

**********

A very good thriller/dark comedy.  Robert Downey, Jr. is very funny as Barris, and the role wass arguably one of the keys to his comeback.  My only complaint is that the rotoscoping style, while smooth, looks too clean to fit the atmosphere of this movie.  A rougher style (like that found in old Ralph Bakshi movies) would have been more appropriate.

4. The Fountain

D: Darren Aronofsky

**********

A spiritual movie with jaw-dropping visual effects.  A lot of people didn’t get it, though.

3. Casino Royale

D: Martin Campbell

**********

Like many people, I was skeptical of this blond guy playing 007, but when I actually watched it, I realized that it was the best Bond movie ever made.

2. Ultraviolet

D: Kurt Wimmer

**********

Yeah, I know.  After listing all these great movies, I put this one on here.  Yes, I know it is a bad movie.  The premise is ripped off, and the plot is poorly thought out.  Still, I love this movie for its visual style and its very innovative fight scenes.  Also Nick Chinlund is very fun as the villain of this movie.  It’s my top guilty pleasure movie.


1. Children of Men

D: Alfonso Cuaron

**********

This movie was amazingly dark and poignant, yet hopeful.  The violence was executed in an extremely effective fashion, and the movie has some of the best single-take scenes ever.  I liked the vulnerability and humanity of the hero as well.

<< 2005     2007 >>