Obscene Censorship…Canadian horror filmmaker prosecuted for supposed obscenity

Read more Americas Censorship News at MelonFarmers.co.uk

See article from m.ctv.ca

A Montreal courtroom is booked for April determine whether a local filmmaker’s graphic horror flick is obscene. Remy Couture faces obscenity charges for creating Inner Depravity, a short film series depicting gory scenes of murder and sexual assault. The goal was to reproduce the deviant mind of a serial killer, said Couture, a special effects make-up artist who’s worked on films such as Barney’s Version. The series, which once won most deranged movie of the year at a film festival, was posted online in 2005 and was eventually forwarded to Interpol and police in Montreal. According to a statement on Couture’s website, Interpol was alerted to the film series by a German web surfer who was under the impression that the on-screen murders actually occurred. Police arrested Couture and raided his studio. Couture maintains that he created the series to flex his skills as a make-up artist who got his professional start in the horror genre. The website featuring his project was only available to web surfers above the age of 18, he said in a statement. You can see the same thing in big budget movies so why mine is worse than the others, I don’t understand, he told CTV Montreal. Police charged Couture with production of obscene material, mainly for his depictions of graphic sexual violence. The charges, however, have drawn criticism from fans and some in the artistic community. He pushed some boundaries because it is shocking with what you can see, but it’s in an artistic way, said Alexandre Duguay, a movie critic and horror aficionado. Couture’s lawyer Veronique Robert said this is the first time she’s seen someone face obscenity charges for the content of a horror film. Previous obscenity cases have dealt with pornography. Couture’s trial will begin in front of a jury in late April, three years after his arrest.

Obscenity Trial of the Decade…Contested jury trial seems to be accepted as a test case to decide on the legality of depictions of fisting, urolagnia and BDSM

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See article from obscenitylawyer.blogspot.com

The 3rd January 2012 marks the first day of the most significant obscenity trial of the decade; which will ultimately clarify the law on the representation of gay fisting, urolagnia as well as BDSM. The defendant in the case, Michael Peacock, is charged on indictment with numerous offences under the Obscene Publications Act for distributing supposedly obscene DVDs. The Obscene Publications Act 1959 features the contentious and ambiguous deprave and corrupt test, whereby an article (for example a DVD) is obscene if it tends to deprave and corrupt the reader, viewer or listener. The Test is defined in Section1 of the Act as: An article shall be deemed to be obscene if its effect or (where the article comprises two or more distinct items) the effect of any one of its items is, if taken as a whole, such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read, see or hear the matter contained or embodied in it. In this trial, which will be heard before the Southwark Crown Court, the films in question feature: gay fisting (the insertion of five fingers of the fist into the rectum of another male); urolagnia (in this case men urinating in their clothes, onto each others’ bodies and drinking it); and BDSM (in this case hard whipping, the insertion of needles, urethral sounds and electrical torture). These activities feature on the current list of what the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) currently consider to be obscene. Ultimately though, it is a matter for a jury to decide whether these acts are obscene by virtue of whether they deprave and corrupt the viewer. Interestingly this case seems to have found unofficial tacit support from the BBFC; and the Metropolitan Police’s Abusive and Extreme Images Unit (the Met’s old obscene publications squad is now part of SCD9): on the basis that this case will establish whether the depiction of fisting and urination pornography is legal or not. Hence, if the jury decides that such pornography is not obscene, on the basis that it does not deprave and corrupt the viewer; then it is entirely likely that both the producers and distributors of pornography will make such material available for sale, for example via licensed sex shops. Consequently, this significant obscenity prosecution will either reaffirm or rearrange the boundaries of obscenity law. Mr Peacock is represented by  Hodge Jones and Allen LLP.. …Read the full article

I Wish I Could See My Little Willy…Exhibition of saucy postcards seized as obscene in the 1950s

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See details from cartoons.ac.uk See also Oo-er missus! The 1,300 confiscated postcards once too saucy for the seaside from dailymail.co.uk

I Wish I Could See My Little Willy I Wish I Could See My Little Willy Templeman Library, University of Kent, Canterbury 23rd September – 13th November 2011 I Wish I Could See My Little Willy: Margate’s 1950s campaign against saucy seaside postcards This exhibition celebrates the completion of the JISC-funded Cartoon Archive Rapid Digitisation (CARD) project which has added 32,000 cartoons to the BCA’s online catalogue. The project included the Director of Public Prosecutions’ collection of seaside postcards seized as obscene by police in the 1950s, and this exhibition features those seized in Margate. The exhibition is free, and runs until 13 November 2011.

Private Publications…Obscenity prosecution re-opened over private online chat

Read more UK News at MelonFarmers.co.uk

Based on article from theregister.co.uk by Jane Fae Ozimek

The prospect of a dramatic extension of the Obscene Publications Act is once more back on the agenda, as the Crown Prosecution Service last week re-opened a case in which an individual is accused of obscene publishing in respect of a private online chat. A prosecution was originally brought in May of this year against Gavin Smith whose log of a private online chat he had with another individual was deemed by Kent Police to be obscene. When the case first came before magistrates, it was discharged on arguments of no case to answer. The CPS have since received new evidence in this matter and, following a review, have decided to re-charge Smith. There will now be a hearing on 30 November.