Grafted follows Wei, a brilliant Chinese scholarship student who moves to New Zealand in hopes of continuing her father’s research: a skin grafting technique that has the potential to change the face of modern medicine. As Wei practices her craft, she becomes isolated from everybody around her. Digging further into the solitary act of furthering her research, Wei suddenly finds herself irreversibly connected to the project, and seeks to use her work for her personal benefit.
★★★☆☆
Writer and director Sasha Rainbow’s feature length debut uses body horror and a helping of sci-fi to tackle a range of themes that have become emergent across the horror genre in recent years: womanhood, identity, and body image. Grafted feels rooted in the horror canon—reminiscent of the science fiction influence seen in Victorian novels like the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and The War of the Worlds. The film plays upon the role of science for inducing otherworldly transformations and playing with the boundaries of human experience.
Although the film’s implementation of science as a driving force for the protagonist’s actions feels fairly fresh, it would be impossible to discuss Grafted without considering the film’s unfortunate potential to be seen as a ‘Twin Film’. Think The First Omen and Immaculate in 2023, or 2022, the year of the two Pinnochios. Grafted exists in the shadow of awards-season darling The Substance, which recently bagged Hollywood A-lister Demi Moore her first award in over a decade. To simplify the films to a basic plotline, both narratives see a talented yet shunned protagonist find a way to enter the in-crowd through an emerging scientific breakthrough, fracturing their identities into ‘better’ versions of themselves until they become an unrecognisable corruption of their former selves. The premise is new and exciting: something that hasn’t been done before. That is, until it was done in 2024. Twice. The fact is, The Substance was a viral sensation. It captivated audiences worldwide, and unfortunately for Grafted, the film’s potential to feel like a unique spin on the body-horror genre has become ‘number two’ in 2024’s entry for cinematic snap.
One of Grafted’s strongest assets is the ensemble cast, made up of protagonist Wei (Joyena Sun), her cousin Angela (Jess Hong), and teenage cronies Eve (Eden Hart) and Jasmine (Sepi T’oa). Angela, Eve, and Jasmine are convincingly vicious entities from the get-go, marking Wei as ‘other’ before she has even had a chance to properly introduce herself. The trio see Wei’s existence in her cousin’s home as an intrusion on their territory, and their spiteful performances as high school elites are a little too close to reality for comfort. Contrasting the other-worldly horror of Wei’s experiments, the real-world horror of high school bullying acts as a successful plot device for furthering Wei’s descent into obsession and jealousy.
The most interesting pairing within the film might be that of Wei and Jasmine, the only member of the trio who doesn’t seem to view Wei as solely an annoyance. Jasmine’s character is almost as complex as Wei’s, and is seemingly just as fractured. She is the only character who shows Wei, a girl who has experienced immense loss and loneliness, any semblance of kindness. Jasmine cares, yet is too involved within her coven to allow herself to fully accept Wei into their circle. The empathetic dynamic between the pair feels like Wei’s last tethering to her original self, and the innocence that existed within her before the corrupting influence of her father’s work.
After a violent twist, Grafted loses its edge and slips into a more conventional slasher format than the film’s previous satirical and distinctive approach to the body horror genre. Wei ends up a villain no longer deserving of the empathy that she had previously won. The devastation of her actions far outweighs the callous behaviour of her social superiors, and ultimately, Wei loses the depth that made her such an intriguing protagonist throughout the film.
The film’s implementation of science as a catalyst for the main horror provides a unique perspective, as it is ultimately Wei’s human nature as a selfish and social-climbing character that determines the film’s outcome. As she undertakes a rampage of revenge, she is betrayed and consumed by the very experiment that she did it all for. The sight is certainly pitiful, and does not feel earned.
Conclusion
It’s unfortunate that Grafted, much like Wei in the film’s final sequence, is not allowed to exist as its own entity. The film is an enjoyable watch, touching on intriguing themes and complex ideas that unfortunately fall somewhat flat. Grafted’s final sequence begs for a shock-factor response from its audience, but it’s hard to find the film to be as surreal and unnerving as may have been intended when pitted against a feature that is more surreal, and more unnerving. The film will find its audience, but perhaps it will be one that hasn’t watched too many films this year.
Words by Jess Parker
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