Here is one last, irreverent look back at the movies of 2008:

Best recurring special effect: Harvey Dent's horrifically ugly mug, post-accident, in The Dark Knight, a face even a mother couldn't love.

Best closing line of dialogue: ''I am Iron Man.'' -- Robert Downey Jr., Iron Man.

Least welcome genre switch: Indiana Jones' unsatisfying venture into sci-fi territory in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Best minor character: From Hancock, Michel (Daeg Faerch), the snotty French boy who insists on referring to the alcoholic superhero in an extremely rude way.

Most pointless achievement: Oliver Stone rushed through the filming of W. in order to release the film while George W. Bush was still in office. But to what end?

Most prolonged throat-clearing: The whole of Quantum of Solace, essentially a prologue to the next, hopefully wilder James Bond movie.

Most effective screen pairing: Jackie Chan and Jet Li in The Forbidden Kingdom, a 12-year-old's dream of a movie.

Most disappointing screen pairing: Robert De Niro and Al Pacino finally got a film's worth of screen time together in Righteous Kill, trapped in a cliche-ridden cop drama that squandered the opportunity.

Most annoying screen pairing: Ashton Kuchner and Cameron Diaz in What Happens in Vegas. Chemistry cannot be faked.

Most surprising kids' movie: Kit Kittredge: An American Girl. Better than you think.

Most disappointing kids' movie: The Wachowski Brothers' Speed Racer.

Most convincing argument this particular ship has sailed: The anemic $20 million box office gross of The X-Files: I Want To Believe.

Best filmmaking debut: Writer-director Courtney Hunt's Frozen River, a visceral, harrowing ode to single parents everywhere.

Most impenetrable filmmaking debut: Screenwriter-turned-director Charlie Kaufman's Synecdoche, New York.

Best directorial comeback: Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona. Every time you think he's done, Woody proves you wrong.

Best acting comeback: Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler.

Best movie nobody saw: The Promotion.

Best movie practically nobody saw: In Bruges.

Best remake: Austrian director Michael Haneke's shot-for-shot, English-language cover of his own Funny Games. Just as pulverizing as the 1997 original.

Worst remake: The Women.

Best example of skirting the farthest edges of the PG-13 rating: The shampoo-and-cut montage in You Don't Mess With the Zohan.

Funniest comedy: Role Models.

Unfunniest comedy: An American Carol.

Most romantic love story:Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist.

Least romantic love story: The on-again, off-again affair -- still! -- between Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Mr. Big (Chris Noth) in Sex and the City: The Movie.

Most illegal love story: A teenage girl (Summer Bishil) and her adult next-door neighbor (Aaron Eckhart) in the underrated Towelhead.

Best vampire movie: The Swedish import Let the Right One In.

Worst vampire movie:Twilight.

Best car chase: In Pineapple Express, James Franco eludes the cops while driving with his leg stuck through the windshield.

Most widely reviled movie we liked: M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening. It wasn't that bad.

Best throwaway line: ''PC or Mac'' -- a sinister Russian embassy agent to the would-be spies (Frances McDormand and Brad Pitt) who have just handed him a disk of supposedly top-secret info in Burn After Reading.

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