The ubiquitous twist zoom

In the CGI Mars landing sequence in Disney's Roving Mars video there is a zoom that simulates the look of quickly twisting the barrel of a zoom lens. It's very effective and brings a journalistic sense of reality to the sequence. I noticed a twist zoom or two in Avatar also used to good effect. Then last night I saw The Taking of Pelham 123 (2009). There are about eight of these twist zooms in there. The twist zoom has become a part of the vocabulary of the hand held shot telling us that we witnessing something happening right now—even if it isn't.