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Monday, Dec 20, 2010 1:01 PM UTC

2010′s most memorable movie moments

Slide show: It was a year dominated by Facebook, a charismatic terrorist and brilliant family dramas

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Topics: Best of 2010, Slide Shows, Movies, slideshow,

2010's most memorable movie moments

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In a year graced with several major films about marriage and family, I’m calling out two pictures about oddly charismatic loners, a pair of men loathed by many and loved by a few, as the most noteworthy movies of the year. Those two guys would be Mark Zuckerberg and Carlos the Jackal, and other than the fact that they’re both living adult males born in the 20th century, any further attempt to draw a connection between them is only going to get me in trouble. In both cases, I suppose, the movies made about them have striven to bring the tremendously seductive power of cinema to bear on the confusion of recent history, and portray world-shifting events — whether it’s the OPEC kidnapping of 1975 or the dorm-room creation of Facebook — through the long lens of drama.

But 2010 is likelier to be remembered for its more intimate moments: A loving, middle-class marriage (that happens to be between two women) jeopardized by an extramarital affair (that happens to involve a man); a royal couple, struggling to untangle the roots of a devastating speech impediment; a rural teenage girl searching for her missing father, with the full weight of adulthood suddenly dumped on her shoulders. Fifteen of the top 20 films on my official 2010 Movie List are largely or exclusively stories about couples and/or families. (I should note that some movies on that list I watched at festivals, and have not been released in theaters this year.) Since that list is nearly complete for the year — it’s just possible another movie or two will still sneak in somewhere near the top — I’ve devised a sort of right-brain, impressive alternative to the familiar top-10 list: a slideshow of the most meaningful and memorable moments and performances I encountered in this year of moviegoing.

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Andrew O

More Andrew O'Hehir.

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The week in 10 pics

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  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

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  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

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  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

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  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

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  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

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  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

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  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

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  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

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  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

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  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

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