Blesk Podcast: Tantuj Matyldo is based on the director’s experience. What all happened?

As recently as 1907, when the disease was discovered, Alzheimer’s disease was considered rare. Currently, according to the Czech Alzheimer Society, more than 7 million Europeans suffer from it, and the number of patients is increasing. Recognizing that a person suffers from this disease is, according to Slavík, very difficult.

“In the beginning, the symptoms of this disease may not be noticed by the patient himself or those around him. In connection with my documentary Life with Alzheimer’s I remember the story of one family when the father retired and before that he was a senior official of a certain insurance company. As he was used to, he always took his briefcase and suit in the morning and went out. The others didn’t deal with it in any way, until it suddenly broke that he continued in the insurance practice. It only broke when there was an insurance event and it turned out that the insurance policies were not valid,” said Slavík, one of the examples of how a disease in which people are often disoriented, forgetful and eventually lose their personality can initially manifest .

Home care

His family took care of his wife’s sick mother for 4 years, his father-in-law held this role for 3 years before them. He also tried the services of a nursing home, but once found her tied to a bed, sedated with pills and covered in feces. “That was the moment that made him want to take her back home,” said the director, who also depicted this difficult moment in his film.

Slavík’s film depicts very raw how the disease worsens and also contains a number of very dramatic situations experienced by a family with a person with Alzheimer’s disease. Slavík outlived many of them themselves. “Up to a certain point, the disease runs like a swing,” admits Petr Slavík.

Rázlova took care of her husband

For the role of Matilda, he had chosen Regina Rázlová for a long time. “She cared for him until his death, so she knows this issue from the other side“, added the director.

Petr Slavík wanted Karel Roden for the role of the executor and son of Matylda, but he never met him personally. “We got in touch with him, sent him the script, and he probably called the same day or the next day that he liked it so much that he would like to do it,” recalled the director of a nice moment. The film is also special for both Rázlová and Roden in that the experienced actress taught the award-winning actor at DAMU, but they had never acted together in a film before that.

Why, according to Slavík, it is better to keep a person with Alzheimer’s disease in home care and what else inspired him for the film, he revealed in Blesk Podcast: