Okay, well my thoughts on the subject are that I don't consider the mere inclusion of a surprise or shock moment to be a real plot twist, nor are cliffhanger endings (which are something in of themselves). For something to be a plot twist there has to be a plot continueing after the story, a twist ending is something else entirely.
One of the problems I have with many "surprises" in movies and such is that there are very few new ones. All of them are cool the first time you see them, but as you get older, see more movies, and become more jaded, you realize how repetitive things get. I can't say I've seen much real originality in years, and what originality comes around is typically beaten to into the ground by an immediate influx of imitators, some of which will probably actually improve on the original work even if they lack the newness.
Going back to one of the most classic twists, read an old story called "The Purloined Letter". Today you might go "well what's so special about that?" but then consider when that was written (and by whom, if you don't know) and you'll rapidly realize that a lot of those twists are simply variations on one of the oldest mystery/surprise stories of all time. Leading me to occasionally sit there and rate whethere something is a GOOD version of that story/twist or not rather than going "OMG, that was original". There are other unique twists that are just as classic and recycled that get the same reaction, but that one is perhaps the all time classic/most used type of twist.
But then again I'm 34, and while not greatly older than a lot of people posting here I think that even coming up in "residential facilities" I think even a scant few years made a lot of differance in the educational system. It seems that shortly after I graduated High School and even Jr. High stopped encouraging children to read a lot of classic literature, probably for political reasons (as everything is left wing nowadays, as opposed to providing writers who lean in differant directions with differant messages and letting people make their own desicians). The writings of Kurt Vonnegut, Edgar Allan Poe, HP Lovecraft (to an extent), Robert Heinlan, Issac Asimov, were all on my required reading lists through the years for various reasons. Today it seems someone says "well we'll hand them some Hemmingway and Steinbeck and call it educational reading" without other writers in counterpoint they lose a lot of impact. A lot of slightly more modern writers are also overlooked. I'll also say that I feel people like Herman Melville have lost a lot of their relevency, and today 90% of what people say about them are trying to project modern opinions onto writings that were devoid of them being totally out of context. With someone like Vonnegut, Heinlan, or Asimov as fantastic as the stories might be at times it's pretty obvious the points they try and make and why they are relevent, or remain that way.
I for example think Asimov's "Foundation" series should be read through an entire year in school as part of a "Reading" or "literature" class or whatever they call it. The reason being is that as it goes on, it pretty much analyzes and generates thought about pretty much every social and political system to exist on any major level in the last few levels, and as it goes on the philsophy lionized and "saving the day" in one story doesn't nessicarly fare so well in another. The ending (which took him a long time to get there) is pretty incredible, and let's just say it winds up supporting a system that I don't agree with, however I believe that's half the point of the story especially given some of the final comments. Not to mention that if you've read it all as of the climax on earth's moon everyone is going to have their own opinions as to what the right path for humanity should have been.
I'm one of those people who would say Foundation is quite probably the best and most continously relevent science fiction series every written.
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