Educational Media Reviews Online

In Flamenco: The Land Is Still Fertile (2022), director Eve A. Ma explores the past, present, and future of Spain’s flamenco. Largely using oral histories and live performances, Ma’s film presents flamenco as an essential aspect of Spanish culture and a folk tradition that spans back centuries and asks the question: Will flamenco survive?

Narrator Antonio de la Malena - himself a professional flamenco singer - guides the viewer through a winding tale of Spanish history and oral tradition. This choice of Malena as narrator and guide is a strong one as he himself is integrated into flamenco culture and serves as a link between the viewer and the flamenco community. The documentary is largely a mix of interviews and performances and does an excellent job of reaching individuals and families that are preserving this gitano folk tradition by traveling to their locations and meeting them directly. However much of the film’s content is often overly redundant and the documentary lasts far longer than might be expected. It also fails to contextualize the folk music traditions of Spain with the larger folk music traditions in the rest of the world.

As it stands, the film could be seen as a piece of cultural preservation and succeeds far more on that front than in answering its own questions about the future of flamenco. It also is quite long for its singular subject matter and likely could have been just as effective at about an hour in length. It will likely be useful shown as clips in a classroom setting instead of the entirety of the film.

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