2000s
In 2001, he landed a role in Tatlı Hayat, a remake of The Jeffersons. He played the role of İhsan Yıldırım, an angry and foul-mouthed, yet lovable dry cleaner. He was accompanied by the actress Türkan Şoray, who has starred in the most feature films for a female actress worldwide, with 222 films to her name in the Guinness Book of Records.
He divorced Zuhal Olcay in 2004 and began a relationship with Aşkın Nur Yengi, a famous Turkish singer. They married in 2006 and had a daughter.
After Tatlı Hayat, he starred in films Neredesin Firuze, "Hırsız Var", "Hacivat Karagöz Neden Öldürüldü?", "7 Kocalı Hürmüz" and "Güneşin Oğlu". His portrayal of the troubled police legend Musa Rami in the film Polis became his most critically acclaimed role after Tatlı Hayat.
Bilginer played the role of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk in an İş Bank commercial, which first aired on 10 November 2007 during the 69th commemorations of Atatürk's death.
He played in the rom-com series "Sevgili Dünürüm" alongside Nevra Serezli, Sumru Yavrucuk, Engin Altan Düzyatan, Rojda Demirer, Didem Balçın, and Cengiz Bozkurt.
Bilginer co-starred in the 2009 American thriller The International as Ahmet Sunay, a Turkish high-tech missile guidance system dealer, alongside Clive Owen and Naomi Watts.
He joined in the second season of the hit series Ezel. With Ezel's co-star Cansu Dere, he starred in the series Şahsiyet, playing a retired court clerk who is diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. The latter role won him an International Emmy Award for Best Actor. He worked again with same director and screenwriter duo Onur Saylak and Hakan Günday in the Netflix series "Uysallar".
Bilginer played an actor who acts as a woman in the series Hayatımın Rolü, an adaptation of Mrs. Doubtfire. He played Aydın in Kış Uykusu (Winter Sleep), which won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014. He worked with Ali Atay on the series "Masum" and "Şeref Bey" for many times, and appeared in the Netflix series "Sıcak Kafa", based on a science fiction novel.
In 2016, he appeared in "Ben-Hur". In 2018, Bilginer played Dr. Ranbir Sartain, the new psychiatrist of Michael Myers, in the slasher sequel Halloween.
In 2020, he played the lead villain Dr. Grief in the first season of the hit Prime Video series Alex Rider, based on the bestselling novels by Anthony Horowitz. In 2023, Bilginer starred as Barbara Nadel's fictional Istanbul detective Çetin İkmen in the Paramount+ series The Turkish Detective.
