Wicked Little Things (2006)

The tale of a widowed mother of two who discovers a dark secret about the land surrounding her newly inherited mountain home. When her husband died and Karen Tunny inherited his family's remote mountain estate, she never could have foreseen the terror that was about to be unfold. It was 1913 when a tragic mining accident claimed the lives of numerous children who were forced to descend into its darkened depths, and their restless spirits are still rumored to roam the area around the sprawling home. Now, as Karen and her two young daughters attempt to pick up the pieces of their shattered family life, the dark history of the land deemed cursed by the fearful locals stumbles screaming into the glowing moonlight of the present as the children who were once buried alive come out to seek revenge.

Director: J.S. Cardone
Writers: Boaz Davidson (story) and Ben Nedivi (screenplay)
Stars: Lori Heuring, Scout Taylor-Compton and Chloë Grace Moretz
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0470000/

Sheitan (2006)

It's Christmas Eve, and twentysomethings Bart, Ladj, Thai, and Yasmine are bored and looking for fun. They end up at a rowdy dance club where, after Bart gets into a fight, they meet Eve, a sexy girl who seems to take a liking to the three guys. Eve invites the foursome to come back to her place in the country; the guys are more than game, and Yasmine tags along for the ride. Eve's house is a ramshackle mansion overflowing with broken plastic dolls and looked after by Joseph, a cheerful but subnormal handyman whose pregnant wife spends most of her time upstairs. Before long, some of Eve's friends from town come by, and while the women are sexually accommodating, Yasmine soon gets the feeling something is wrong, and in time the guys reach the same conclusion. Joseph's topics of conversation become downright creepy as he talks in great detail about incest and Satanism with his guests, and Christmas Day devolves into an orgy of violence and perversity.

Director: Kim Chapiron
Writers: Christian Chapiron and Kim Chapiron
Stars: Vincent Cassel, Olivier Barthelemy and Roxane Mesquida
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0450843/

The Last King of Scotland (2006)

In an incredible twist of fate, a Scottish doctor on a Ugandan medical mission becomes irreversibly entangled with one of the world’s most barbaric figures: Idi Amin. Impressed by Dr. Garrigan’s brazen attitude in a moment of crisis, the newly self-appointed Ugandan President Amin hand picks him as his personal physician and closest confidante. Though Garrigan is at first flattered and fascinated by his new position, he soon awakens to Amin’s savagery - and his own complicity in it. Horror and betrayal ensue as Garrigan tries to right his wrongs and escape Uganda alive.

Director: Kevin Macdonald
Writers: Peter Morgan and Jeremy Brock
Stars: James McAvoy, Forest Whitaker and Gillian Anderson
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455590/

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006)

Born in a fetid fish market and raised in a dilapidated orphanage, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille toiled his childhood away in a rank tannery run by the thuggish Grimal. Subsequently obsessed by smell, Grenouille's keen olfactory sense becomes so finely tuned that it eventually overpowers such human qualities as love and compassion. Though he has indeed discovered the unmistakable scent of a woman, Grenouille finds it impossible to connect with the fairer sex on any sort of meaningful level. Roaming the streets of Paris late one night, Grenouille catches the scent of a young girl selling plums and impulsively strangles her, later sniffing her nude corpse in a twisted attempt to preserve the distinctive scent in his memory. After persuading legendary perfumer Giuseppe Baldini to take him on as an apprentice, Grenouille travels to the town of Grasse in Southern France in order to learn the art of enfleurage at a firm run by the highly respected Madame Arnulfi. It is there that Grenouille becomes dangerously drawn to the vestal aroma of the young and beautiful Laura, the daughter of widower merchant Antione Richis. Soon driven to madness by such a pure scent, the spellbound Grenouille continues to claim the lives of the numerous young girls in a tragic attempt to bottle the impossibly elusive smell of virginal womanhood.

Director: Tom Tykwer
Writers: Andrew Birkin and Bernd Eichinger
Stars: Ben Whishaw, Dustin Hoffman and Alan Rickman
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0396171/

Tristan & Isolde (2006)

After the collapse of the Roman Empire, King Donnchadh of Ireland has become the de facto ruler of England, but one of his underlings, Lord Marke, dreams of uniting British forces with an eye toward self-rule. One of Marke's most valuable allies is Tristan, Marke's protégé, who has become a brave warrior since he was rescued by the lord after his parents were murdered by Irish forces during a battle. While Marke and Tristan dream of banishing Ireland's presence in England, Tristan has a secret he's been hiding from Marke -- after suffering serious wounds during a hard-fought battle, he was rescued and nursed back to health by Isolde, King Donnchadh's daughter, and the two fell deeply in love. But the couple were separated after Tristan returned to England, and when Donnchadh attempts to quell the British uprising by staging a tournament among the nation's greatest warriors, an extreme and rather personal surprise is in store for Tristan.

Director: Kevin Reynolds
Writer: Dean Georgaris
Stars: James Franco, Sophia Myles and Rufus Sewell
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375154/

Marie Antoinette (2006)

The story begins in the late-18th century as the Austrian Archduchess Marie Antoinette agrees to marry Louis-Auguste. After bidding adieu to her mother, Maria Theresa, she travels to France, where King Louis XV sets the rules -- and the list is endless (Comtesse de Noailles is the primary enforcer). As for the Dauphin, he's just a boy, really, with more interest in his key collection than their marriage bed. Should Marie produce an heir, it might be enough to sustain her -- since life is nothing but an endless shopping spree -- but clouds gather on the horizon as an impoverished populace rises up against their extravagant leaders.

Director: Sofia Coppola
Writer: Sofia Coppola
Stars: Kirsten Dunst, Jason Schwartzman and Rip Torn
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0422720/

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (2006)

Followed by The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2004). The year is 1969, and despite the fact that the Vietnam War is raging halfway across the globe, all is ominously quiet on the back roads of America. Eighteen-year-old Dean Hill has just received his draft notice, and his older brother, Eric, is determined to watch out for his younger sibling by ensuring that Dean enroll in the Marine Corps rather than risking his luck at the local induction center. Dean has other plans, though, and as soon as the pair and their girlfriends, Bailey and Chrissie, return from their final fling in sunny Texas, he plans to confront his brother with the prospect of dodging the draft. When an unsettling encounter with malevolent bikers Holden and Alex results in a serious car accident in which Chrissie is thrown from the vehicle, the arrival of Sheriff Hoyt at first appears to be a moment of divine intervention. However, when Sheriff Hoyt murders thieving Alex in cold blood and then shepherds her friends into the back of his police cruiser as Chrissie watches from the brush, their momentary reprieve soon gives way to an unimaginable terror. As Hoyt transports her ailing friends to the Hewitt home, where a childlike man named Thomas is currently undergoing the transformation into cannibalistic madman Leatherface, a desperate Chrissie attempts to enlist the aid of Holden in rescuing her friends from a fate worse than death.

Director: Jonathan Liebesman
Writers: Sheldon Turner
Stars: Jordana Brewster, Matt Bomer and Diora Baird
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0420294/

Black Snake Moan (2006)

Lazarus is a hard-living ex-blues guitarist for whom the troubled days are beginning to outnumber the good. Rae is a 22-year-old sex addict whose wild ways are finally about to catch up with her. When Lazarus discovers Rae covered in dust and clinging to life on the side of the road, he takes her in and nurses her back to health; but Lazarus isn't your typical caregiver, he's more concerned for Rae's immortal soul than he is for her physical well-being. Now, after chaining Rae down and employing the power of the Good Book to curb the salacious seductress' hedonistic ways, Lazarus will be forced to confront his own darkest demons in order to save the soul of a woman whose one-way ticket to hell has already been paid in full. Now, as Lazarus wages a righteous struggle to redeem the soul of the fallen Rae while simultaneously ensuring that his own life hasn't been lived in vain, the situation threatens to explode as Rae's possessive boyfriend, Ronnie -- a roughneck Guardsman currently preparing for a tour of duty in Iraq -- comes searching for his missing lover.

Director: Craig Brewer
Writer: Craig Brewer
Stars: Christina Ricci, Samuel L. Jackson and Justin Timberlake
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0462200/

Hatchet (2006)

Followed by Hatchet II (2010). Ben has just been given his walking papers by his girlfriend and is deeply depressed. Needing a pick-me-up, Ben and his friend Marcus head to New Orleans for Mardi Gras, and take in a "Haunted Swamp Tour," with master of ceremonies Shawn guiding guests through a spooky patch of bayou country. Along the way, Ben and Marcus meet a pair of half-bright exotic dancers, Misty and Jenna, as well as Marybeth, a pretty girl who is secretive about her past. As they tour the swamp, Shawn tells his customers about the local legend of Victor Crowley, a deformed man who was taunted by the other children living near the swamp until he was nearly bludgeoned with an axe by his father while trying to open the door of their burning shack. While Ben and Marcus don't think much of the story at first, it doesn't take long before they have serious reason to believe Victor Crowley is still at large -- and is looking to settle some old scores. 

Director: Adam Green
Writer: Adam Green
Stars: Kane Hodder, Joel David Moore and Tamara Feldman
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0422401/

Apocalypto (2006)

The Mayan kingdom is at the absolute height of opulence and power, but leaders are convinced that unless more temples are constructed and more human sacrifices made, the crops, and ultimately the people, will suffer. Jaguar Paw is a peaceful hunter from a remote forest tribe whose life is about to be changed forever. When Jaguar Paw's village is raided and he is prepared as a sacrifice that the Mayan deities have demanded, the brave young hunter is forced to navigate a horrific new world of fear and oppression. Fearlessly determined to escape his captors and save his family from a harrowing demise, Jaguar Paw prepares to risk it all in one final, desperate attempt to preserve his dying way of life. However, few who have seen the sacrificial alter of the Mayans have managed to live to see another day. Now, in order to rescue his pregnant wife and young son, Jaguar Paw will have to elude the most powerful warriors of the Mayan kingdom while using his vast knowledge of the forest to turn the tables on those who would rather see him dead than set free.

Director: Mel Gibson
Writers: Mel Gibson and Farhad Safinia
Stars: Gerardo Taracena, Raoul Trujillo and Dalia Hernández
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0472043/

Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

Carmen recently remarried to sadistic army captain Vidal and soon to bear the cruel military man's child, shy young Ofelia is forced to entertain herself as her recently-formed family settles into their new home nestled deep in the Spanish countryside. As Ofelia's bed-ridden mother lies immobilized in anticipation of her forthcoming child and her high-ranking stepfather remains determined to fulfill the orders of General Francisco Franco to crush a nearby guerilla uprising, the young girl soon ventures into an elaborate stone labyrinth presided over by the mythical faun Pan. Convinced by Pan that she is the lost princess of legend and that in order to return to her underground home she must complete a trio of life-threatening tasks, Ofelia sets out to reclaim her kingdom and return to her grieving father as Vidal's housekeeper Mercedes and doctor plot secretly on the surface to keep the revolution alive.

Director: Guillermo del Toro
Writer: Guillermo del Toro
Stars: Ivana Baquero, Ariadna Gil and Sergi López
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0457430/

Pulse (2006)

Followed by Pulse 2: Afterlife (2008). When wireless technology puts humans into contact with an unstoppable force that's determined to claim the lives of the living for the souls of the damned, it's up to a group of determined teens to close the gate before it's too late. A doorway between the human realm and the spiritual realm has been opened, and now the technology that once made humankind the ruler of the planet has become its digital Achilles heel. With every call made and every e-mail checked, life is slowly being stolen from the living and claimed for the dead. With no way of turning off the connection and no means of reasoning with a force they cannot understand, a desperate group of college students must discover a means of stopping the takeover before the entire planet is transformed into a cosmic haunting ground for wayward souls in search of a home.

Director: Jim Sonzero
Writers: Wes Craven and Ray Wright
Stars: Kristen Bell, Ian Somerhalder and Christina Milian
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0454919/

The Fountain (2006)

 

Three stories - one each from the past, present, and future - about men in pursuit of eternity with their love. A conquistador in Mayan country searches for the tree of life to free his captive queen; a medical researcher, working with various trees, looks for a cure that will save his dying wife; a space traveler, traveling with an aged tree encapsulated within a bubble, moves toward a dying star that's wrapped in a nebula; he seeks eternity with his love. The stories intersect and parallel; the quests fail and succeed.

Director: Darren Aronofsky
Writers: Darren Aronofsky
Stars: Hugh Jackman, Rachel Weisz and Ellen Burstyn
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0414993/

Hollywoodland (2006)

 

George Reeves was a journeyman actor who had played a small role in Gone With the Wind and appeared onscreen with the likes of James Cagney, Rita Hayworth, and Marlene Dietrich, but his career was not exactly booming when he was cast as comic-book hero Superman in a 1951 B-movie, Superman and the Mole Men. A year later, the producers of the movie launched a syndicated Superman television series with Reeves returning as "The Man of Steel." The show became a major hit, and Reeves was a star at last. However, on June 16, 1959, to the shock of many, Reeves was found dead of a gunshot wound. Police soon declared Reeves' death a suicide and closed the case, but his mother refused to believe her son took his own life, and hired Louis Simo, a private detective, to find out the truth about her son's passing. Simo found that many Hollywood insiders did not care to cooperate as he researched the Reeves case, but his digging uncovered plenty of evidence suggesting the actor did not take his own life, and he also revealed one of Reeves' deepest secrets -- while he was engaged to marry a pretty young starlet, Leonore Lemmon, Reeves was also carrying on an affair with the beautiful Toni Mannix, the wife of Eddie Mannix, a powerful and ill-tempered executive at MGM.

Director: Allen Coulter
Writer: Paul Bernbaum
Stars: Adrien Brody, Ben Affleck and Diane Lane
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427969/

Ultraviolet (2006)

 

In the late 21st a disease called Hemophagia has genetically modified nearly an entire race of people, leaving them with such enhanced speed, intelligence, and strength that they resemble vampires in nearly every way. Fear begins to breed within the power elite as the disease continues to spread and those infected prove to be truly superhuman, and now, a civil war is brewing between uninfected humans and those altered by Hemophagia. Caught dead in the center of it is an infected woman called Violet, who is bent on vengeance and has little left to lose. Provoked beyond reason by powers that will not rest until she and her people are dead, she will become everything her persecutors feared her to be.

Director: Kurt Wimmer
Writer: Kurt Wimmer
Stars: Milla Jovovich, Cameron Bright and Nick Chinlund
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0370032/

Special (2006)

Les Franken leads an unassuming life that rarely deviates from a strict regiment of working, eating, sleeping, and comic book reading. His only two friends are a pair of stoners who own a local comic shop, so Les determines to shake things up a bit by volunteering as a test subject for an experimental drug designed to curb depression. When the drug appears to give Les special powers, the doctor in charge of the clinical controlled test insists that Les is simply experiencing an unanticipated psychological reaction to the medication. But Les is convinced that his powers are genuine, and as he ditches his work uniform in favor of more superhero-appropriate threads, he is about to find out once and for all whether he truly is able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, or his depression, combined with the strange side-effects of the drug, has somehow propelled his superhero fantasies to the forefront of his damaged psyche.

Directors: Hal Haberman and Jeremy Passmore
Writers: Hal Haberman and Jeremy Passmore
Stars: Michael Rapaport, Paul Blackthorne and Josh Peck
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0479162/

Curse of the Golden Flower (2006)

During the latter days of the Tang dynasty, the Emperor returns home from the war with his son Prince Jai in tow. However, the monarch gets a chilly reception from the Empress; though she's eager to see her son, her marriage has become deeply acrimonious, and she's taken a lover, Crown Prince Wan, her stepson from the Emperor's first marriage. The Emperor, meanwhile, has his own plan for dealing with his failing marriage -- he's ordered the Imperial Doctor to find an exotic drug that will drive the Empress insane and administer it to her without her knowledge. However, the doctor's ethical dilemma is intensified by the fact his daughter Chan has fallen in love with Crown Prince Wan and the two wish to elope. As the Emperor and Empress allow their estrangement to sink into violence and retribution, their youngest son, Prince Yu, struggles to keep the peace in the household.

Director: Yimou Zhang
Writers: Yu Cao (play) and Yimou Zhang
Stars: Yun-Fat Chow, Li Gong and Jay Chou
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0473444/