Inside Amy Wang's Provocative Race-Swap Body Horror Film 'Slanted'
In director Amy Wang's audacious feature debut Slanted, a mysterious procedure allows people of color to become white permanently, creating a provocative exploration of race, identity, and societal power dynamics. The film, which won the 2025 narrative feature grand jury prize at SXSW, blends dark satire, body horror, and coming-of-age drama to examine difficult questions about assimilation and self-acceptance.
Personal Inspiration Behind the Premise
Wang, an Asian Australian writer and director who emigrated to America in 2015, drew inspiration from her own experiences as an immigrant and teenager. "I moved to Australia when I was seven and didn't speak English – it was a tough time for me," she admits. The 2021 Atlanta spa shootings, where six Asian women were killed, further intensified her feelings. "It was the first time I felt genuinely unsafe here," Wang recalls.
These experiences led to a recurring teenage thought: "Wouldn't life be easier if I were white?" Wang transformed this past feeling into art through Slanted, creating a film whose premise deliberately pushes boundaries to examine societal norms.
The Film's Central Concept and Execution
In Slanted, an insecure Asian American high schooler named Joan undergoes a procedure at a mysterious cosmetics clinic called Ethnos. The clinic's tagline – "if you can't beat them … be them" – reflects the film's exploration of assimilation extremes. Joan, played by Shirley Chen, transforms into Jo, portrayed by McKenna Grace, after the surgery renders her visibly white.
Wang explains her approach: "The core concept was satirical, but I couldn't imagine it as a dramatic satire. I wanted the movie to feel like Mean Girls at the beginning and then kind of feel like a nightmare. How do I evoke that? Well, through body horror." While the film shares transformation themes with other works, Wang notes her concept predated similar films and focuses more on quiet familial damage than visceral horror.
Exploring Identity Through High School Setting
Setting the story in high school proved both instinctive and strategic for Wang. "When you're in high school, everything feels so heightened and dramatic," she says. This environment gives believability to the film's more absurdist moments while examining social hierarchies. Wang aimed to "take the all-American girl trope, so well-known, so coveted, and flip it on its head."
The film's most affecting scenes draw from Wang's personal memories, particularly those involving Jo/Joan and her parents, played by Fang Du and Vivian Wu. These moments transition from comedy about cross-cultural misunderstandings to painful examinations of immigrant family dynamics and sacrifice.
Performances and Cultural Resonance
McKenna Grace, while not Asian American herself, connected deeply with her character's experiences. "She related to the bullying, the feeling of wanting to belong," Wang explains. "She even embraced the Mandarin. She was on Duolingo and would send me videos of herself practising."
An improvised line from Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, playing Joan's friend, highlights the film's exploration of diverse experiences within communities of color: "Do you think I'm ugly too?" Wang recalls podcast host Sam Sanders responding that watching Slanted made him consider whether he would have taken surgery to become straight as a teenager. "To me, that's the whole film," Wang says. "It's about confronting what you're uncomfortable with and putting it on the surface."
Wang's Hollywood Journey and Future Vision
Wang has been part of Hollywood since graduating from AFI in 2017, producing Netflix's The Brothers Sun and writing on the forthcoming Crazy Rich Asians 2. She describes Slanted as the necessary flip side to more joyous projects – "not the triumph of representation, but the cost of its absence."
Now living in America for over a decade, Wang still finds certain aspects surprising, particularly how "drug advertisements and billboards list all the side effects. I will never get used to that." She embraces her Asian and Australian identity with a "who cares" attitude that comes with age, noting that "it really is a lifelong journey – finding the specific version of yourself that fits, that you can be proud of."
For Wang, Slanted represents a reclamation of her past self. "I hope to keep making movies that confront and explore the why, and in doing so, help somebody else feel seen and feel less judged." The film is currently showing in US cinemas with UK and Australia release dates to be announced.
