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This dissertation argues that the alternative digital movies that emerged in the early 21st century Malaysia have become a part of the Malaysian national cinema. This group of movies includes independent feature-length films, documentaries, short and experimental films and videos. They closely engage with the unique conditions of Malaysia’s economic development, ethnic relationships, and cultural practices, which together comprise significant parts of the nationhood of Malaysia. The analyses and discussions of the content and practices of these films allow us not only to recognize the economic, social, and historical circumstances of Malaysia, but we also find how these movies reread and rework the existed imagination of the nation, and then actively contribute in configuring the collective entity of Malaysia.

The goal of this thesis is to investigate the effect of long takes that appear in the films made after WWII. To demonstrate how these long takes provides the effects, this thesis employs two different approaches. The first approach synthesizes previous film studies' descriptions about three characteristics of long takes in post-WWII films. The second approach uses the discoveries from experimental psychology to discuss how spectators' attention functions while viewing these long takes. By comparing these two different approaches, this thesis also points out that cognitive film studies are valuable because they are able to illustrate the long-take viewing experience of spectators in general rather than only film scholars, who are the dominated voice in interpreting the effect of long takes in post-WWII films.