"The Man Who Saw Frankenstein Cry" is a 74 minute documentary covering the life and best known films of Spain's 'King of Horror' Paul Naschy, who wrote, produced and directed under his real name, Jacinto Molina. His early life during the Spanish Civil War, cinematic yearnings, and weightlifting years set up his fascinating, extremely prolific film career, encompassing over 100 titles in 42 years. Most amazing of all, he scripted 44 of them as well, utilizing locations convenient for his low budgets, especially the ancestral home best remembered from "Horror Rises from the Tomb." At 74 minutes, there really isn't enough time to cover all the movies, but his best known all get a mention, from his starring debut in "Frankenstein's Bloody Terror," to "Count Dracula's Great Love" and "The Mummy's Revenge." The only difficulty I encountered were that the subtitles were occasionally difficult to read against certain backgrounds, but it was a brilliant idea to feature English captions when Spanish was being spoken, and vice versa. We hear from Naschy's devoted wife and both of his sons, plus we see his joy at meeting his fans in America, overwhelmed at the warm response, and refusing to charge a cent for his autograph. The story behind its title is saved for the very end, as Naschy witnessed a tearful Boris Karloff, during filming of an episode of I SPY, waiting for the car that would return him to his hotel. Mick Garris hosts in English, supported by actors Jack Taylor, Caroline Munro, and Maria Jose Cantudo, and filmmakers Joe Dante, John Landis, Donald F. Glut, and Javier Aguirre. A loving and deserved tribute to a fitting subject, hopefully just the first of many.

THE MAN WHO SAW FRANKENSTEIN CRY (2010) is a nice little tribute/documentary to the great Paul Naschy, consisting of an overview of his lengthy career alongside interview clips and comments from fellow filmmakers, family members and fans. The title refers to an incident in 1967 in which Boris Karloff visited Spain shooting an episode of I SPY. Naschy was working as an extra on the episode and spied Karloff sitting in the rain, weeping to himself, and the image stayed with him.

For fans of the horror legend this is a real treat and it's great to see such talents as John Landis and Joe Dante applauding his work. My main complaint is that it's too short! There are so many films to go through that each only gets a couple of minutes discussion before we move onto the next; this could easily have been double the length. Also, as this was made posthumously there's no interview footage with the great man himself, just a few behind-the-scenes shots. Lots of nice little anecdotes though like his tangles with the Yakuza or when he went to a fan-signing in America and refused to charge a cent for his autograph, spending hours wearing his wrist out. Great stuff.

Did you know that we like Paul Naschy movies here? Oh, you've seen us post one of his movies every few weeks? You know who else likes him and talks about him in this documentary? Just people like John Landis, Joe Dante, Antonio Mayans, Caroline Munro, Javier Aguirre, Jack Taylor, Jorge Crau and Donald. F. Glut.

Beyond hearing how Jacinto Molina Alvarez became Naschy, you also learn how his films fit into the troubled history of 20th century Spain and how his hard work led him to live out his monster movie dreams.

From stories about encounters with the Yakuza while making The Beast and the Magic Sword to what happened to the never released Howl of the Devil and every bit of werewolf-fur covered piece of history in between, this movie is a feast for Naschy fans or anyone wanting to learn more about Spanish horrror.