If you’re looking for a bold, thought-provoking new film on the 2026 movie schedule to check out, look no further than Slanted. This movie is the debut feature from filmmaker Amy Wang, and during CinemaBlend’s conversation with her, she told us why it's actually a rather personal film to her.
Slanted is about a Chinese-American high school student named Joan (played by Shirley Chen from the underrated, excellent film Didi) who has had dreams of becoming prom queen, but isn’t at all popular. When the chance to have an experimental ethnic modification surgery is offered to her, she takes the opportunity thinking life will be easier and prom queen will be in reach. It works (turning over the role to Mckenna Grace), but the quote “be careful what you wish for” applies here. Check out what Wang told us about coming up with the movie:
The idea came to me back in 2021 when there was a shooting at a spa in Atlanta, Georgia. A bunch of Asian American spa workers were killed. I immigrated to to America in 2015, and for the first time I kind of felt scared and it made me relive the experiences that I had growing up in Australia as a teenager and the feelings of wanting to belong and feeling othered and afraid… as a teenager, there would be many days when I would wake up and think, would life just be easier if I was white?
Back in 2021, a surge of Asian hate crimes happened in the U.S., including the incident Wang spoke to, and they predominantly targeted Asian women. It was widely attributed as a reaction to the racist rhetoric and scapegoating of Asian Americans for the COVID-19 pandemic, per The Marshall Project. As Wang shared in our interview, hearing about these events not only made her fear for her safety, it brought up some feelings she had previously dealt with as a teenager.
Article continues belowIn Slanted, when Joan goes through the surgery, one huge part of the storyline is how it affects her family life. When I asked about constructing this aspect of the plotline (which I found to be a particularly heartbreaking part of the movie) she added:
The movie is very much based on my life and my parents were both very supportive parents. So that kind of just organically came together in the script because I was drawing from such personal experiences with my own parents. And like, there's a moment in the film when [Joan] says to her parents ‘I wish she would just learn how to speak English.’ And that's something that I have said to my parents too because my parents didn't really learn English when I was growing up in Australia. So just all of that, it was very cathartic to kind of put on the page and to be able to work through it and understand it now, you know?
Slanted is an independent film that premiered at the South By Southwest Film Festival a year ago before Bleecker Street acquired the rights. You can check out the Slanted trailer below:
The movie has earned praise from critics, who are calling it “very entertaining,” “an absolute riot” and having “unique twists”. I also got the chance to talk to the movie’s supporting actors, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan and Amelie Zilber, who play Joan’s best friend and the high school “it” girl. They said that they were initially unsure about signing on to the project due to the "controversial" nature of the film, but they grew excited after learning about Amy Wang’s daring vision.
Slanted is in theaters now, and you can check out what other upcoming horror movies are on the way here on CinemaBlend.
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
