Is Gory News #11 the new Monster Mag of our times?

[Mike]

German and Austrian Horror fanzines are doing very well.
Without understanding the language I found out the following
very interesting publications:

SPLATTING IMAGE magazine

http://www.moviemags.com/main.php?title=SPLATTING%20IMAGE


PRANKE magazine

http://www.moviemags.com/main.php?title=PRANKE


DEADLINE magazine

http://www.moviemags.com/main.php?title=DEADLINE


RAY magazine (from Austria)

http://www.moviemags.com/main.php?title=RAY

Deadline is really Gory News, which change its name.
Issue #11 of Gory News Magazine is nowhere to be seen.
The Gory News site at http://www.gorynews.de/ has this as a cover:


And the wonderful Mad Mags at http://www.madmags.de/ uses this:


and the following note:

"Censored Cover!
This is only a censored illustration of the cover. A German court decision has banned the public reproduction of this picture because of «glorification of violence»."

The whole thing brings in mind the case with Monster Mag #2.
All issues of #2 were confiscated by the English police and destroyed.
Only French and German issues exist today.

I have also found the following interview with Yazid Benfeghoul, the editor of Gory News, at
http://www.the-pit.de/interviews/d/deadline_%25_das_filmmagazin/2006_12_16/119/index.html
where he mentions the facts like this (don't understand much and can't translate)

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The-Pit.de: Ein eher düsteres Kapitel in der GN Geschichte war ja seinerzeit die fragwürdige Indizierung der Ausgabe Nr. 11 gewesen. Wie kam es damals dazu und in wie fern hatte diese Amtsentscheidung für Euch persönliche Konsequenzen?


Y.B.: Um sauber anzufangen: Ich habe stets und von jeher einen Altersnachweis von meinem jeweiligen Besteller angefordert und archiviert, so dass es nicht mir zu verdanken ist, dass irgendein Minderjähriger, der das Heft wohl bei einem verantwortungslosen Händler erstanden hat, in die Hände bekam und daraufhin auch dessen Mutter oder Erziehungsberechtigte, die dann meinte, gefährliches Gedankengut erwischt zu haben, so dass es zu einer Anzeige kam. Die Ankündigung der Indizierung und auch die letztendliche Indizierung könnt ihr in der “Gory News“ 12 und 13 nachlesen.
Eine solche Gesetzesentscheidung sollte man mindestens einmal im Leben gelesen haben; dann weiß man nämlich garantiert, dass man noch gesund ist. Persönliche Konsequenzen hatte es keine: es wurde die damals best verkaufte Ausgabe. Und das, obwohl, und das betone ich, seitdem, nie wieder ein Heft auf dem Postweg an einen Endkunden geschickt habe, was ja nicht erlaubt ist. Dafür haben es mir Grosshändler (sprich: Gewerbetreibende) aus den Händen gerissen, was erlaubt ist! Ist die Welt nicht gerecht?
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[Mad Mags]

Hello Mike,

this is the uncensored cover of Gory News #11:


(click to enlarge)

Because of a court decision I can't present it on Mad Mags, but maybe you can present it on Moviemags.com

I try to translate the part of this German interview (sorry for my bad English): Yazid Benfeghoul (that's the real name of the publisher!) has always sold his fanzine Gory News to adult readers (18+ years old). Unfortunately a teenager bought this issue somewhere else (maybe a video dealer, or a convention) and his mother gets ahold of the magazine. She reported to the police... The result: due to this nice cover artwork Gory News #11 gets banned in Germany. Yazid tells #11 was the best-selling issue ever... ESPECIALLY because of the court decision

[Mike]

Thank you very much for the cover.
It's really very extreme.
I can almost understand now the court decision.
And of course as it often happens with this kind of decisions they have the best indentions but they bring the opposite result:
They add publicity to what they want banned.

Many thanks also for the translation. It's excellent.
Although I find the cover very extreme I 'm glad that Yazid Benfeghoul, the publisher, had no more troubles with the law. Publishing a magazine is already a risky business.

I will show the cover in this site, adding a warning that this picture is for adults only.

[Mad Mags]

Something about the other mags:

«Splatting Image» is a prozine and covers a lot of exploitation and horror flicks. And it deals now and then with porn movies... what makes it unique in Germany. The reviews and articles in this magazine are often very intellectual and demanding... and sometimes they're only nonsense dressed up as scientific facts

«Pranke» is my favorite German fanzine. Until 2003 it was a «real» fanzine and xeroxed with a black & white photocopier. Today «Pranke» is still a fanzine, but now it is duplicated in a professional printing company. Its focus has changed from monsters-only movies to the whole «fantastic» genre cinema. The printrun is very limited (about 600-700 copies of the last issue). By the way... I was allowed to contribute some articles to this magazine in the last years

«Deadline» is published by the same crew as «Gory News», but now it's a prozine. GN was a 100% fanzine.

[Mike]

Now, this is much appreciated information for all of us that sprechen no Deutsch. Many thanks.

I think I found another German publication called Virus magazine, but I don't think its a 100% movie mag. Lots of music as far as I can tell.



VIRUS rising! Issue 17 of Germany's leading horror magazine contains a mind reaping mixture of MOVIES, GAMES, MUSIC, PEOPLE and ART. FROM THIS ISSUE ON VIRUS WILL SPREAD IT'S DISEASE ON 16 ADDITIONAL PAGES!

VIRUS 17 (available on May, 11th, 2007) brings you:

MOVIES: HOSTEL 2, PRIMEVAL, INVISIBLE

INTERVIEWS: DANNY BOYLE (Sunshine), SHINYA TSUKAMOTO (Tetsuo – Iron man, Tokyo Fist, Nightmare Detective), LARS PETER LUEG (German Radio Play Publisher), ANDREAS SCHNAAS (German Underground director)

ART: PAUL GARNER, JASON D'AQUINO, HEILEMANIA

MUSIC FEATURES: BOBBY STEELE – THE UNDEAD (3-Page-Interview), THE METEORS (Interview), THE NEKROMANTIX (Interview)

MUSIC REVIEWS:
THE METEORS – Hymns For The Hellbound, HELLBATS – Undead'n Alive, SCARLET AND THE SPOOKYSPIDERS – Pop Your Eyes Out And..., THE SHE WOLVES – Mach One, THE COSMIC VAMPIRES – Historias Der Terror, TIGER ARMY – Music From Regions Beyond, THE RIPMEN – Graveyard In Our Memories, BITCHSLICER – Lycantropic Fellatio, THE BAD BEERS – Music From Beyond the Surf, THE TREMORS – Invasion Of the Saucermen, DOMMIN – Mend Your Misery, THE GRAVETONES – Dig it!, HELLSONICS – Demon Queen, THE SPOOKSHOW – Psychosexual Chapter 2, FRANK THE BAPTIST – The New Colossus, THE HORRORS – Strange Room, THE DEEP EYNDE – Bad Blood, DEAD END GUYS – Among The Dead, CREATURE FEATURE – The Greatest Show Unearthed

All this from:
http://www.myspace.com/virusmagazine

[Mad Mags]

I've got only one issue of «Virus» in my collection. You're right, «Virus» contains a variety of subjects: literature, comics, art, games, movie news, retrospectives, and lots of advertisement I don't like these «mixed magazines».