What a year it's been! A real mixed bag at the movies, what with some colossal disappointments and some truly magnificent gems that nobody saw coming. As is tradition each year, I'll pick my five favourite films and the five films I hated the most -- the Hits and the Pits of 2007. Personal choices all, these are the films that made me smile and sulk. Irrespective of their box office performance or the reviews these films received, they played a lot on my mind – either for the joy they gave me, or the pain I suffered on their account.

The Hits

Taare Zameen Par: No other film this year made you smile and cry in equal parts. Noble, well-intended and oozing sincerity, Aamir Khan's directorial debut turned out to be a small film with a big heart.

Chak De India: Who'd have thought a film about girls playing hockey would give the nation an anthem? It moved many to tears, and Shah Rukh towards real acting.

Metro: Anurag Basu's take on urban angst made us mutter recognition. The endless hunt for love, the endless hunt for sex, the endless hunt for the hunt, it all happens in the cubicle next door, and Basu brought it all to life in this tale of interconnected city-hopefuls.

Black Friday: The jinx was broken as Anurag Kashyap's dramatic masterpiece finally hit the box-office, leaving everyone saying exactly the same thing -- what a blast! Honest and true to life, this film made us shiver as shrapnel and incisive dialogue crackled across the screen.

Guru: Pulling off a punchy -- also paunchy -- coming-of-age performance as Dhirubhai Ambani-inspired Gurubhai, Abhishek Bachchan emerged the best thing about Mani Ratnam's believable but blustering drama. Hardly the director's best film, but an engaging story nevertheless about the conflict between power and morals.

The Pits

Saawariya: Who'd have thought Sanjay Leela Bhansali could make you feel so blue? Too busy being a poet on screen, Bhansali forgot the storytelling idiom as a result.

No Smoking: Insisting it was his most personal work yet, Anurag Kashyap's film turned out to be too much self-indulgent rambling and a terrible waste of both film and talent.

Laaga Chunari Mein Daag: Can you imagine Parineeta's Pradeep Sarkar directing a story that made Ekta Kapoor's soaps look avant garde? Enough to say we'll never see Rani Mukherjee, Benares or escort girls the same way again!

Gandhi My Father A father and son in conflict, and history in the making. Sounds interesting, right? Well, theatre director Feroz Khan's debut film was that history lesson told in such a one-note drone that it made you long to rest your head on a pillow.

Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag What can we say about a debacle that has rewritten history? I'm still reliving this regurgitation of a classic and the horror of watching Amitabh Bachchan, Ajay Devgan and Mohanlal participating in it!