MONTREAL — There will be "big consequences" for Canada's horror film industry if a jury finds Quebec special effects artist Remy Couture guilty of corrupting morals, says a Montreal-based documentary filmmaker.

Frederick Maheux recently completed a documentary film on Couture, who is currently on trial for producing a violent and macabre short film that international police thought depicted real events.

Montreal police arrested Couture, 35, in 2009, after someone complained to the international police agency, Interpol, about content on Couture's website. Among other gory and violent imagery, the site contained a short film that depicted a woman being mutilated and raped.

Maheux told QMI Agency on Saturday that he has already felt the consequences of Couture's arrest.

Quebec's film board and the police confirmed to Montreal's La Presse newspaper that DVDs of Maheux's documentary were recalled from video rental stores in Montreal and seized by police. The documentary included some of the footage created by Couture.

"It was catastrophic for that to happen to an independent filmmaker like me," Maheux said.

Couture's trial continues next week. He is officially charged with corrupting morals through the distribution of obscene material.

On Friday, the Crown presented its last witness, psychiatrist Peter Collins.

He said that sexual deviants don't discern between real and fake imagery. Whether a woman is tortured for real or not is of little importance to the sexual sadist, Collins explained.

However, his testimony was contradicted on Friday by the defence's first witness, Marc Ouimet, a criminology professor at University of Montreal, who told the jury that there is no evidence suggesting pornography incites people to commit violent, sexual acts.

One of Couture's supporters is Dave Alexander, editor-in-chief of Rue Morgue magazine, an international publication that celebrates the horror culture.

Alexander told QMI Agency Saturday that he thinks Couture created particularly revolting and violent scenes in order to show off.

"You need to stand out in your field," Alexander said.

He added that movies that depict shocking acts of violence are more helpful to society than those that glorify it.

"Horror movies should make you sick," he said. "In Hollywood films, someone gets shot and they get to say a few last words, death is represented as noble. But violence is not like that. It's bloody and disgusting and awful and I think there is value in representing it that way."

- With files from Michael Nguyen