Amy Wang’s Directorial Debut ‘Slanted’ Wins Narrative Feature Jury Award at SXSW 2025

Many dream of being crowned prom queen, but Joan Huang is willing to undergo transracial surgery to do it. Writer-director Amy Wang’s debut feature film “Slanted,” starring Shirley Chen (“Didi”), Mckenna Grace (“Young Sheldon”) and Maitreyi Ramakrishnan (“Never Have I Ever”), took home SXSW’s Narrative Competition Jury Award. Using satire, Wang unabashedly unpacks growing up in an environment where white is the standard. Wang sat down with TRIBEZA to talk about making “Slanted” and developing future projects.

What draws you to satire as a narrative device?

Dealing with difficult topics like race and in particular with “Slanted,” it’s very confronting. I didn’t want the movie to just be a straight drama. I think that would be so much more difficult for audiences to accept, especially with the concept that’s absurd… As a filmmaker I love pushing buttons. I love confronting people. I love challenging people. I was really excited to create this absurd, hyper version of America. This story in that kind of world, it just made sense to me.

There are some elements of body horror in this film, how did you find the balance of displaying that with just the right amount of gore? 

It’s been so funny hearing people compare the movie to “The Substance.” When I was coming up with the concept, “The Substance” (was not out yet)… I had grown up watching like Cronenberg, and was always a fan. (Body horror is) not the main kind of genre. The main genre for this movie is definitely still satire.

I love Ruben Östlund (director of “Triangle of Sadness”), and I’d watch “Sick of Myself” by (Kristoffer Borgli)… “Sorry to Bother You” (Boots Riley), I watched it again on a plane. All of those films were at the forefront.

This film seemed to be such a personal story for you and others involved in the making. Was there a specific childhood memory that informed the creative process?

I just moved to Australia at the time, maybe seven or eight years old, and I was at the Botanical Gardens with my family. This white, older man just came up to us, started saying things like, ‘go back to China,’ like very racist things and followed us around for a couple of minutes. 

It was just a really obviously traumatizing experience, because I can still remember it so many years later. It made me feel very unwelcome in a new country that I was trying to assimilate into. From then on, I just became very aware of how different I looked, how different my culture was. 

It was announced that “Slanted” won the Narrative Jury Award. What does this recognition mean to you?

I gave up everything back in Australia to come out to the United States. I didn’t know a single person… It’s been a dream of mine to be a filmmaker since I was a teenager… One of my first jobs was at Blockbuster Video, back when it was still around. I breathe cinema. 

South by Southwest is one of the greatest festivals in the world, and to even have been accepted was so emotional for me… Just to be at the festival was incredible, and meeting all these other filmmakers and to have won the Jury Prize is like the greatest that has ever happened to me… My parents were so proud. My dad was weeping… it’s honestly a dream come true.

What stories are you excited to tell in the future?

I’ve already written my next project. It’s called “Crescendo,” and it’s set in the world of competitive piano playing. It’s kind of an “Amadeus” meets “Black Swan.” (It) deals with these two women. It deals with envy and competition. It’s very thriller-y, brutal, no comedy in this next one. I’m so excited to send that script out and hopefully get it made very, very soon.

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