The Madame Aema Franchise

I now bring you Madame Aema, the longest-running and most popular franchise in Korean film history. It’s pornography.

On my rare porno-watching days, I doth feel the need to protest too much, and justify my actions. This blog is founded upon watching all theatrical franchises (meaning four or more, with weird rules governing remakes and other effluvia). Pornography counts, out of a sense of completion, though surely I’m not about to deal with the multitude of video sequels (which proliferate solely around adherence to a niche fetish). Rather, I aim to be as calm and unexploitative when recounting heaving torrents of flesh. In the case of the Madame Aema films, I am aided in my prudishnesh by the franchise’s complete lack of availability.

Yeah, decades old South Korean pornography is not readily available – who’d-a-thunk it? None of my usual obscurity resources turn anything up (“aema” alone reveals nothing on YouTube, even). I’m not about to wander into the local Koreatown neighborhood and announce to some shopkeep that “Yes, uh, hello. Hi. I’m looking for eleven specific antique South Korean pornography movies that – Oh, you have Kim-Dong Ill? No, sorry, I can’t you that mo- Heyyyyy!”

And simply Googling “South Korean pornography” causes my computer to have probskllxzcA $RW)POXZSA A .*&^


Anyway…Madame Aema can owe its existence to a loosening of censorship upon Korean film in 1982. This often seems to be the way it is, that once greater sex and violence are allowable in a medium, that medium starts genuinely experimenting with that freedom. Hence the loss of the Hays Code in favor of a rating system led to movies like A Clockwork Orange and Midnight Cowboy, whose initial ratings were actually concurrent with what we’d now call pornography: NC-17s, though both are now simply Rs. A discussion for another day and another franchise should explore the very notion of mainstream adult erotica. That franchise would be France’s Emmanuelle, and it seems to have been the inspiration behind Madame Aema.

That inspiration governs what I know of Madame Aema’s plot, about a married woman exploring extramarital affairs in order to broaden herself and enter sexual knowingness, in that particular 1970s sense. Evidently, the tone is similar too, striving for softcore erotica in favor of explicit grotesquery. This is kind of an interesting cinematic movement, erotica, in that it attempts to titillate using subtlety and innuendo instead of graphic sexuality. It hopes to be publicly acceptable, to sexually inspire its audience without catering to raw animal lust. This sounds a most challenging proposition, to skate that thin edge just this side of outright pornography. It’s an endeavor of an earlier time, before video moved adult entertainment back into the realm of niche – not that pornography itself nowadays isn’t successful (far from it!), but excepting Pirates (no link provided, because that one is pornography) there isn’t much output which aims for all viewers at once.

That’s what I mean by “niche” – “fetish,” basically, specialization so extreme, it rather negates grander cinematic artistry. Though a luminary no lesser than Stanley Kubrick once boasted, in his megalomania, that he had the skills to actually make a full-on pornography movie, and still make it as artful as 2001 (in his mind, A Clockwork Orange doesn’t float that NC-17 bill). The nearest thing we got is Eyes Wide Shut, which ain’t quite there either, and I’m sure Kubrick would say so much.


Okay, so back to Madame Aema. Its object of sexual awakening is housewife Oh Su-bi (Ahn So-young). She’s emphatically not named “Aema,” because that’s actually a portmanteau, of either 愛馬婦人 or 愛麻婦人, meaning “Horse-Lovin’ Lady.” This is thankfully not a literal meaning, or I’d perhaps ban myself from the Internet. Instead, it’s presumably common Korean slang, basically their way of saying “Sexaholic Whorebag.” Only, you know, artfully.

So Oh Su-bi’s husband Shin Hyun-wu (Lim Dong-jin – heh heh, “Dong”) has lo these past two years been in prison for homicide. Despite her devotion to him, and despite his evidence of marital villainy (like a Tyler Perry antagonist), Oh Su-bi engages in affairs with certain other fellows in her apartment complex. One paramour disgusts her with his perverted sexual predilections (I am glad my research doesn’t turn up greater details, considering what I’ve seen in non-pornographic Korean film!); another contrasts that with “pure love.” Divorce and France are tossed about, perhaps in direct reference to the Asian-set French Emmanuelle, but in the end Oh Su-bi stays with her husband, now released, and I’m not sure what they’re getting at from this synopsis in terms of female rights or the sexual revolution or the sanctity nor marriage or any pertinent themes.


Trying to get deeper, as it were, into the truth behind director Jeong In-yeob’s artistry, I delve into the wonderful realm of Korean websites (making a point of avoiding North Korea’s self-serving, narcissistically hilarious propagandography). Here’s what I discover (NSFW-ish), in a historical evaluation of the Aema phenomenon:

“70년대를 풍미했던 나 같은 이른바 호스티스영화가 남녀의 육체가 포개질 때 ‘컷’을 외쳤던 반면 은 억눌려 있던 포르노적 욕망을 집중적으로 분출시켰다. 극단적인 클로즈업과 성애를 갈구하는 노골적인 환상이 그때는 정말 충격이었다. 80년대의 아이들은 애마의 풍만한 가슴에 매달려 걸음마를 배웠다..”

Then again, run through Babel Fish:

“70's flavor me which does the hostess movie piled up the flesh of the man and woman what is called is same and at the time of quality the other side which shouts `cuts ' hundred million gushed the porno desire which is being pushed intensively. The claw [cu] which is extreme [ep] with the characteristic child will go and the fantasy which is outspoken buys that time was true shock. 80's the children a toddle was hung in the breast which the pet horse is plump and learned.”

That’s just maddeningly unhelpful.


Madame Aema inspired a wave of copycat Korean erotica throughout the ‘80s. Completely by assumption, I imagine it somewhat like the earlier Franco-Japanese In the Realm of the Senses, in that it makes a genuine effort to combine art house impulses and semi-explicit sexuality. It is likely a lot like the “pink films” which had already dominated Japanese culture – forever it seems Korean culture is in a game of hot potato with Japan. Like those pink films, the post-Aema Korerotica blurred the distinction twixt mainstream and sexploitation, often competing alongside more traditional film types for regular, non-pornography awards and distinctions. It was basically a legitimate genre, not a separate branch of moviemaking, as evidenced by maybe Aema’s greatest inheritor, Mulberry – that one won Best Film, Actress and Actor among Korean film critics, so unless the nation is completely inundated with leering perverts (…likely), these are clearly more than just stag films.


Looking over a synopsis for Madame Aema 2 (1984) confirms so much. Oh Su-bi (which now appears to be the actress’ name, as the character is now called “Madame Aema” – I dunno) is now divorced, and fielding another pair of potential suitors, embodying varying philosophies on sex, love and marriage. Seemingly, 2 comes squarely to the conclusion that those various ideas do diverge, as Aema (I’m just gonna call the protagonist that from now on) rejects matrimony. Alongside tactful descriptions of velvety, soft-focus love (likely with foreground objects doing Austin Powers wang-hiding duty, a “pink movie” tradition), there are descriptions of other scenes you mightn’t expect from erotica. Scenes like Aema collecting butterflies, or riding a saddleless horse along the shore – toplessness optional. Whatever the actual tonal effect of these moments, they’re clearly something you won’t find in your average Skinemax epic.


Certainly by 1985’s Madame Aema 3, Aema is no longer the same woman – this is evident partly because of new lead actress Kim Boo-seon, and partly because this Aema finds herself stuck in a loveless marriage to an entirely new foil, Professor Noh. Of course, it would be too much to ask for one Aema to endlessly sexually reawaken on a schedule concurrent with popular film cycles, so basically resetting the stage allows them to run through the same plot sans justification. So again Aema (or Emma, as they’ve now gone with) dabbles in affairs, now with a professional wrestler. Then due to her husband’s huge load (of research), she “wanders the streets in despair.” That’s a hell of an ending!

I guess I’d better start examining this specifically as a series at some point. A series is defined by repetition, and that’s something pure, raw sex undoubtedly can deliver. Eroticism perhaps cannot, as the more often naked genitalia are waggled artfully before us, the less artful that becomes. One pictures Aema, and the rest of Korea’s “folk erotic” movement, getting tugged by the dichotomous dictates of the Criterion mentality, and the trench coat crowd. With more entries, the nearer it gets to the latter, and so the Aema cycle bows out early in the mid-‘80s, dignity still intact.


Enter the ‘90s! In the desperate rush before video completely destroyed the viability of theatrical adult film (which had its last mainstream “hurrah” in the U.S. with Showgirls), the years 1990 through 1995 saw a relative avalanche of Aemae, butter-churning out eight sequels in that time. That means two years (1992, 1993) doubled up.

Each entry now welcomes a new cast, always a new Emma, with no continuity between films. Instead, all explore the same thematic ground, as Emma doubts her marriage, has some sex elsewhere, her husband likely does the same, then each resolves either in divorce or faithfulness. From the summaries (and stills on the Korean Movie Database) these things are kind of like those Danielle Steele books – you know, the ones with Fabio on the cover.

There is no ultimate trajectory for a series preoccupied with repetition, with variations on a formula as if it were simply a subgenre, so like a subgenre it simply becomes a waiting game, to see how many of these things can happen before people simply tire of them. There’s evidently so much similarity between sequels now, I’ll only amuse myself with identifying the ways in which they differ…


Madame Aema 4 (1990): This one appears the first where the husband’s affairs dictate matters. By all evidence, the Emma has herself some fornication too. Otherwise, not much to report, except Emma has a daughter too, which drives emotion, but doesn’t appear to have a bearing on the series’ sexual promiscuity.

Madame Aema 5 (1991): Two daughters now. Also, the usual sordid tales are set at a ski resort, possibly in Japan. This is a change from the usual setting, which by all evidence is Korea’s Jeju Island.

Madame Aema 6 (1992): This one is interesting. It makes note of the rotating roster of so-called Emmas, and actually imagines a multi-generational family of women, all of them somehow named Emma. Not sure how this works, nor how you can have three sisters all with the same name. Whatever’s going on, it allows for a greater quantity of adult angles, which undoubtedly means there’s less actual thoughtfulness. And with the female cast thus expanded exponentially, things start to resemble more traditional male-centric pornography, while the series has previously distinguished itself with its genuine feminine point of view.


Madame Aema 7 (1992): One Emma. A performance artist. Performance art utilized as a perversion enabler. That is all.

Madame Aema 8 (1993): Two Emmas, both of them dancers. One gets married, the other doesn’t, yet each has differing opinions on the institution. This one sides with marriage in the end.

Madame Aema 9 (1993): Emma has an affair, then returns to her husband. There doesn’t appear to be anything noteworthy here.

Madame Aema 10 (1994): During an Emma’s expected marital separation, she lives with a female friend. The series now wholeheartedly delves into lesbianism, which has received at least minor consideration before. Well, dudes love that stuff! But to counter this potential slide into pandering, the token male adulterer is named simply Mr. F. Ignore your immediate “Arrested Development” impressions, for this is possibly a variation on French genre standards like Story of O, indicating the Aemae still intend occasional sophistication.

Madame Aema 11 (1995): The sex stuff in the final entry seems de rigeur. Rather, it’s the tertiary details which appear unique. Like some sci-fi/gangster movie, Emma’s husband develops a “revolutionary new technology” – I picture an Inception dream invading tech, perhaps. Then the Yakuza burst in and interrupt sex scenes for the rest of the movie!


Then the series abruptly ends, without celebration, as it has transitioned into a niche realm by 1995, and Korea’s flirtation with erotica has subsided. Which leaves the most noteworthy days of Madame Aema well in the past, and makes conclusions hard to come by. So I’ll just wander on off in a most anticlimactic manner, and leave it at that…

[Sound of me strolling out of my apartment.]

[Sound of door closing.]

[Long, empty silence.]