8 More Moments That Literally Stopped Movies

4. Margot Robbie's PSA (The Big Short)

Margot Robbie The Big Short
Paramount Pictures

It generally doesn't bode well for a movie's success if the vast majority of people have no chance in hell of understanding its plot, so 2015's The Big Short attempted to rectify this issue by repeatedly pausing the action to explain, well, everything.

These pauses grind the movie to a halt for minutes at a time, while various celebrities explain all the complex financial concepts that are relevant to the plot. In one scene, Selena Gomez pops up and starts talking about synthetic CDOs, but the most memorable interlude is one involving Margot Robbie, who informs us about mortgage bonds while relaxing in a bubbly hot tub.

The movie first acknowledges that most people will find all the financial jargon incomprehensible and dull, before introducing Robbie to liven the subject matter up. To be honest though, it still doesn't make a lot of sense to your average Joe, but props to writer-director Adam McKay for at least trying to explain things in a fun way.

Hell, maybe Christopher Nolan should've done something similar with Tenet! Just get Christian Bale to explain all that timey-wimey stuff in his iconic, growly voice, while hanging upside-down like a bat. That's a billion-dollar movie right there.

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Contributor

Danny has been with WhatCulture for almost nine years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. He has been writing and video editing for 10+ years, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers and uploading them to YouTube (they're admittedly a bit rusty by today's standards). If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order or to tell you about the making of 1988's Remembrance of the Daleks, Danny is the person to ask.