(If you do not have time to read this entire post, just skip to the very last sentence.)
Print has long catered to our short attention spans. Remember the Reader's Digest condensed versions and Classics Illustrated and Cliff Notes? What's surprising is that film, which claims our attention even less than print, hasn't gone into this much more:
LONDON, England (AP) -- U.S. director George Lucas has given permission for the "Star Wars" saga, which lasted for over 13 hours, to be shortened to a production of just 20 minutes, officials from Britain's Reduced Shakespeare Company said Tuesday.
The company is famous for staging the Bard's 37 plays in just 97 minutes and has also staged "The complete history of America" and "The Bible: the complete word of God," among other abbreviated productions.
If even that is too taxing for you, let me simplify:
In a universe long ago and far away, there was a republic that was good, and the force was with it, and then bad, because it succumbed to the dark side. The greatest Jedi warrior ever became Darth Vader, who was really Luke's father, which probably explained why Luke thought he was in love his sister until Hans Solo -- he came back! -- saved the day. Along the way were Jabba (boo! hiss!) and Jar Jar (lame!) and that cute little zen-muppet-philosopher creature and lots of space ships that moved real fast and blew up lots of stuff good.
There. You still have 19 minutes left. Invest it wisely.
("If you don't take time for the authentic thing, you will miss important stuff," he said succinctly.)
