There were a lot of distinctive winners and losers in the Summer of 2008. There also were some interesting cases that didn't quite fit one category or the other. Chris Neumer harkens back to the words of Rosie Perez in White Men Can't Jump, "Sometimes when you win, you really lose. Sometimes when you lose, you really win." It's not that cut and dried here, but here are ten people for whom there is more than initially meets the eye:

DECEPTIVE LOSERS...
• Rainn Wilson
Adam Sandler has a reputation for acting in low-brow comedies directed by his friends (including Dennis Dugan and Peter Segal). Every once in a while he ventures into new territory like Punch-Drunk Love, Spanglish or Reign Over Me and the results tank miserably, regardless of their quality. Sandler is just not a commodity that you can sell to the indie crowd. It’s the exact opposite situation in which Parker Posey finds herself. Dismissed by the film snobs, Sandler is as unassuming and under-the-radar a $20 million man as can be. Mention to almost anyone that Sandler is paid better than Don Cheadle, George Clooney and Leonardo DiCaprio and the reaction will be one of first shock and then horror. His inclusion on the $20 million man list is because when he stars in his low-brow comedies that are directed by his friends (like 50 First Dates, Click, Anger Management, Mr. Deeds and now, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry) they are almost guaranteed to make $100 million. With I Now Pronounce you Chuck and Larry’s box office coming in at roughly $120 million, Sandler has ensured a continued $20 million payday for himself (in low-brow comedies directed by his friends) for as far as the eye can see. Ten years of hits, Little Nicky being the one notable exception, can do that for you. Very few people on the A-list have as much job security as does Sandler and I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry did absolutely nothing to hurt this.

• George Lucas
Actor John Cusack had the quietest summer hit of the last several years in the movie 1408. I didn’t remember much pre-release press or marketing for this film or its release date, but it didn’t matter as the roughly $25 million film went out and took in almost $75 million this summer. Yes, the material was based upon a Stephen King short story, but the reason for this windfall was thanks to the presence of the supreme master of the likeability index himself, Cusack. Cusack has proved time and again that he can put asses in the seats and here, he did it again in an above average horror/thriller. When a film you’re anchoring makes its entire budget back during its opening weekend, you know you’re doing something right.

• Brendan Fraser
It’s a commonly held belief that there are only three types of roles for women in Hollywood: daughter, mother and grandmother. If you’re an actress and over the age of 50, watch out! The scripts involving you as the family matriarch will come flying at you like Japanese zeroes at Pearl Harbor. Michelle Pfeiffer recently crossed the half-century mark and decided to play with convention by appearing in director Matthew Vaughn’s Stardust as an evil witch who uses black magic to appear like, well, a beautiful Michelle Pfeiffer. Elegant, gorgeous, charming and still most capable of delivering a punch outside the ‘grandmother’ heading, Pfeiffer added a significant amount of relevancy to her career with this captivating performance. The only downside of her resurgence her is the number of “50 is the new 40” stories it generated.

• XXXXXXXXXX
John Krasinski was a co-lead in one of the summer’s worst reviewed and received movies (a movie so bad, I can’t even remember it’s title, I’m going to have to look it up), License to Wed. Although License to Wed opened on July 3 in more than 2,600 theaters, its first weekend took in a paltry $10 million; its total box office topped out at just over $43 million. In spite of this poor box office take, this supporting player from NBC’s The Office, Krasinski, did very well for himself. Consider: In 2004, Krasinski played a character named “Messenger #3” in the Jimmy Fallon bomb, Taxi. In 2005, Krasinski was guest starring on single episodes of Without a Trace and CSI. In 2007, Krasinski got an above the title credit on a major summer release opposite Robin Williams and Mandy Moore. At this rate of ascension, Krasinski will be president of the galaxy by sometime in 2012.

• Everyone associated with Indiana Jones
For nine arduous years, stand-up comedian Kevin James anchored CBS’ sit-com, The King of Queens. Despite the lowest common denominator nature of the series and plot strokes that would feel at home on My Wife and Kids, Step by Step, Full House, The George Lopez Show or just about anything involving Jim Belushi, James landed a well-received supporting role in Will Smith’s comedy hit Hitch. This summer James grabbed the lead opposite Adam Sandler in Universal’s $85 million production, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry. With I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry’s $115 million domestic box office, James has proved that he holds a certain amount of star power. His next film, speculated to be One Nation Under Bob, has him in the catbird’s seat, carrying the movie by his lonesome. It’s hard to think of I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry as being a big boon for anyone, but as Sandler and James proved, they definitely received career validation and solidification from it.

DECEPTIVE WINNERS...
• Brendan Fraser
Angelina Jolie is one of the biggest, most well known and loved actresses on the planet. She can’t go anywhere without teams of papparazzis following her and isn’t even able to change her kids’ diapers without it being reported as news. Jolie has been on the cover of Vanity Fair, People and Esquire among many other magazines this summer alone. She is married to one of the most diverse, beautiful and talented actors on the planet, Brad Pitt. Her face and life story are known by hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Funny thing though, she had a movie that came out this summer and nobody went to see it. A Mighty Heart opened in more than 1,300 theaters and had an opening weekend of less than $4 million. If we can believe the circulation numbers for the top celebrity magazines like US Weekly, In Touch and OK! Weekly (roughly 1,000,000 per issue), then US Weekly (which costs 3.95) earned more the week did Jolie’s well-reviewed movie opened than A Mighty Heart itself.

• Scott Prendergast
Actor Christopher Mintz-Plasse had one of the best breakout roles of the summer, playing “McLovin” in Superbad. Mintz-Plasse was perfect for the role of McLovin, a combination of a high school aged Woody Allen and pre-Edward Scissorhands Anthony Michael Hall. He (and his gloriously inappropriate name de plume) stole the show from stars Michael Cera and Jonah Hill time and again. Mintz-Plasse winds up here because, unfortunately, his career has already peaked here in his breakout role (see also: Jon Heder from Napoleon Dynamite). Should Mintz-Plasse continue acting, he will not be able to land any roles outside of that of a nebbish high schooler or, depending on the script, a nebbish college student. He is three years removed from starring opposite Kal Penn in a "National Lampoon Presents" movie that goes directly to DVD.

• Andy Samberg
Initially, I was going to put Megan Fox on this list because it seemed as though she would have a hard time getting passed the designation of the latest “hot girl”, being forever doomed to a life of tight fitting clothes and horror films. However, since she has already been cast in the lead of the indie film How to Lose Friends and Alienate People opposite Jeff Bridges, Kirsten Dunst and Gillian Anderson, it effectively contradicted that sentiment. I removed her from the list. Then as I continued reading Fox’s biography, I learned that she is engaged to Brian Austin Green of Beverly Hills 90210 fame… and she went back on. Brian Austin Green? I mean Brian Austin Green? He’s already doing guest starring work on CSI, she’s anchoring the cast of Transformers and has one of the most downloadable publicity stills of all time. Brian? Austin? Green?

• Jason Statham
John Travolta struck box office gold again this summer with the surprise hit, Hairspray. And he did it while having a sense of humor about himself and playing a part in drag! There’s only one problem with this. While Travolta does get the top listing in the cast, he isn’t in any matter, shape or form the lead of the movie. The actual lead, Nikki Blonsky, needs a much better agent; she ended up with the thirteenth cast listing in New Line’s production notes. Travolta’s character is so minor, his/her name doesn’t even appear in Roger Ebert’s lengthy plot write up.

• Will Smith
Anytime you can direct a movie that grosses nearly $300 million you’d think it’d be a good thing for both your career. In this respect, David Yates is a winner, but he earns his place in this list because no one knows who he is. Quick, tell me what movie Yates directed… You don’t know? Okay, quick, tell me any movie that Yates has directed… What? You still don’t know? Yates and Richard Marquand will have a great many stories to share about their almost anonymous work on two supremely massive hit movies. What? You don’t know who Marquand is?

(Yates directed Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Prior to this project, he did two TV movies called The Girl in the Café and Sex Traffic. As for Marquand, he directed a little film called Return of the Jedi.)