The west has always been trying to turn games into movies, just look at the SEGA CD and all the failed CD based consoles before of past eras.
The difference between then and now is that instead of FMVs we have "epic" cutscenes where your only interaction is mashing a button or a trigger or just moving the camera in a 30 degree cone, because we can't have the player miss this amazing cutscene we blew 15% of our budget now, can we.
Why do you think some publishers are soo butthurt at let's players, when some of the best bits of their games are the cascade of cutscenes between the lumps of banal gameplay that also happens to be in a corridor.
As for why do soo many people injoy them? Because they're very easy to entertain, same explanation as Michel Bay's movies.
