The name would be more familiar if Antonia Santiago Amador, a.k.a. La Chana, had not been forced into a temporary retirement by an abusive husband. “He made me stop when I was at the summit that every artist craves,” says the fiery Catalan flamenco dancer, now in her late 60s, whose untrained style is scrutinized to this day by reverent students. That man, who eventually ditched his wife and took everything with him but the kid, is deliberately left opaque in this often painfully intimate (if slightly thin) portrait. In La Chana’s youth, she was courted by Hollywood (Peter Sellers put her in 1967’s The Bobo); here, we see her prepare for a final performance as a barely mobile sexagenarian, made all the more nerve wracking thanks to sizzling archival footage of a woman possessed by raw genius and unholy power whenever she hit the stage.

Georgia Straight, July 2017