Because you can(‘t) have it all: representations of female sexuality in South Korean Casa Amor

ABSTRACT This article examines the recent 2014 South Korean sex comedy Casa Amor: Exclusive for Ladies, in an attempt to contextualize representations of female sexuality within the socio-geographic discourse. At the same time, it aims to demonstrate the ways in which ideals of the third wave feminist thought are employed in order to first seemingly promote, but ultimately trivialize and discount the experience of female sexuality. Despite South Korea’s status as a technologically fast developing state, societal topics of gender and sexuality continue to be sensitive and difficult to portray in the media. This article brings to the readers’ attention the Neo-Confucian roots of this patriarchal legacy, as well as its current situation in the context of cultural and legislative taboos that are sex and pornography. In the latter part, the essay focuses on the analyses of on-screen femininity presented in Casa Amor, employing feminist concepts such as ‘girlfriend culture’ and ‘womance’. It also provides a comparative reading of the Korean feature to its original predecessor, Brazilian De Pernas Pro Ar, emphasizing the former’s transnational values and critiquing its failure to reclaim ‘the women’s gaze’.