When I was a kid I thought “talkie” was such a ridiculous, funny-sounding word for the advent of films with sound. It was only years later that I realized that the word “movie” which I had never thought twice about was almost the exact same thought process for, you know, pictures that moved.

And hence why we call it “métrage” in French, as in “un long métrage” (a feature film) and “un court métrage” (a short film) ; because we measure in metres !