What's the point of quick time events?

They're quick.
And timely.

To make you do cool shit that wouldn't be possible with normal gameplay

Convenient devices for game devs who are too lazy to turn their movie into an actual game. See: Uncharted, Spiderman, God of War, or any other big Sony exclusives.

>>383574181
They were originally intended to keep the player semi-involved during cutscenes and later became a lazy fallback for developers who didn't know how to make engaging gameplay.

>>383574181
to make sure you are paying attention to the game and if you are not or if you scratch your nose at a wrong time you get punished