For the film Monstrum, a model of the Stalin monument will be constructed in Letná

Prague - A model of the statue, which was the largest group monument in Europe in the 1950s, will rise in Letná, Prague these days due to the filming of a movie about the author of the monument to Stalin. The film Monstrum follows the fates of sculptor Otakar Švec and his wife Vlasta, who ended their lives with suicide before the monument was unveiled. ČTK was informed today by the spokesperson of Czech Television, Alžběta Plívová.

"The film's leitmotif will be the deep, suggestive connection between the intimate love relationship of the Švec couple and the immense, ruthless mass of granite, which gradually becomes an absurd symbol of destruction not only for them but also for society as a whole," said Jan Lekeš, whose production team is creating the film. The monument in honor of Soviet leader Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was unveiled in Letná in 1955 and was demolished seven years later after the condemnation of his cult of personality.

"We will indeed build that monster over Prague. And we will also blow it up later," said the film's director and screenwriter Viktor Polesný, who last directed the two-part film Zločin v Polné for ČT. He wants to tell the story of a noble man and a great artist who hesitates, "falls into temptation and shakes hands with the devil,” he added.

The model of the group sculpture was created over several months in workshops in Kavčí hory. Filmmakers produced a nearly six-meter-high head of Stalin, which will be supported by another six meters of scaffolding. With the help of digital effects, part of the monument, which originally had a height of more than 15 meters, will be completed. Several models of different sizes were also created for filming, so that the film could show the production of the sculpture in all its stages. No technical documentation of the original monument has survived, so the filmmakers relied on period literature, photographs, and films.

"His fate was a reflection of the cruel era in which he lived and created. I am fascinated by how this terrible time is being trivialized and downplayed today by some people, including politicians," said Jan Novotný, who portrays Švec in the film. Vlasta, Švec's wife, is played by Zuzana Stivínová, and his student will be portrayed by Martin Kraus.

Filming of Monstrum began near Mladá Boleslav. In addition to Letná, filming will also take place in other locations in Prague, such as in Ledeburská Garden, on Střelecký Island, at the National Memorial on Vítkov, or at the Academy of Fine Arts.

The "meat queue," as the monument depicting Stalin with an entourage of eight was unfavorably but aptly called, cost a staggering sum of 140 million crowns at the time. The monument weighed 17,000 tons, and to prevent it from collapsing into the Vltava, an extensive reinforced concrete underground was built beneath it.