Evidence of Character
One film is about a law that barred unsightly people from public space. The other is about a girl who is told she looks healthy at the point she is weakest.
Both are about the same assumption: that a body is evidence of what kind of person you are. In 1867 it was written down. Now it arrives as a compliment, and nobody has to defend it because nobody has to say it.
“Any Way you Want Me " is an independent short film about a teenage girl’s journey toward finding self-love regarding her appearance in a world where external validation and conformity are prized.
The girl realizes that society’s perception of her body can be distorted, misleading, and limiting, leading her to define herself and her worth beyond others’ words.
The film begins with a teenage girl feeling insecure about herself. She feels she is too tall, unfeminine, and a little chubby, and thus wears an oversized hoodie and glasses every day. One day, she embarks on a journey to feel better about herself and decides to begin modeling, where some of her features are embraced, to receive validation. Yet first, she is asked to change to become more “successful.” After changing her identity, people call her “healthy,” “desirable,” and “confident,” even though she feels weaker, more self-conscious, and less like herself than before. No one is seeing her. Instead, they are reading beauty as proof of happiness, discipline, and worth.
At the end, she puts her hoodie and glasses back on and stands up straight in front of the mirror. She does not see society’s reflection of her, but rather her own beauty through her own eyes.
She realizes she was never unworthy before, that her life should not be dictated by others, and finds acceptance in her oversized hoodie, glasses-wearing self.
This animation explores how the logic of historical ordinances, colloquially named the Ugly Laws that originated in San Francisco, manifests in modern society. The Ugly Laws called for the prohibition of those deemed “unsightly” from public spaces, using physical appearance as a marker of one’s social and moral identity or worth. In South Korea, lookism remains a dominant force.
This animation demonstrates how beauty enhancement procedures are no longer simply for aesthetic reasons–they can be a mode of survival in a society where looks make identities legible and thus discriminate based on such prejudice.