The emotions writer-director Juraj Lerotić recreates in his film Safe Place, feel so authentic that viewers who don’t know that the story is in large part autobiographical, will likely sense it anyway.
There are scenes of such intimacy, one almost hesitates to intrude. The bond between two brothers belongs to them alone, their connection is deeply private, and we never learn what happened between them prior to the tragic event we witness.
The opening scene is of a nondescript apartment building that could be in any city. Kids play, pedestrians walk their dogs. A man comes running to the entrance, we sense his desperation, he rushes into an apartment where a man lies in his own blood on the floor.
The men are brothers. The younger one, Damir (Goran Marković), just had tried to take his own life. The older one, Bruno (Juraj Lerotić), is trying to keep him alive. Damir is in shock when the ambulance arrives. He is dazed, silent, and he never stops looking at his brother like a stunned, wild-eyed child.
Is Bruno the cause of Damir’s suicide attempt? Is Damir riddled with feelings of guilt for hurting his brother and their mother who rushes to his hospital bed? Does Damir even know why he did what he did? Or did he even do it? The police find a knife in Bruno’s pocket.
Bruno and his mother insist to the authorities that Damir had shown no signs of mood swings or had suffered from depression in the past. But that is hard to believe in view of the morbidly deep sadness that paralyzes Damir. For his astounding portrayal as the deeply wounded Damir, Gordan Marković won best actor in Locarno’s Cineasti del Presente competition.
Juraj Lerotić as the older, care-giving brother Bruno is equally impressive. He was awarded the Best Actor prize at the Film Festival of Sarajevo. As a writer, Lerotić was able to transfer a personal tragedy into a convincing script, then took the helm as a first-time director and cast himself as the lead actor.
Safe Place focuses on the dark moment the brothers find themselves in. But true to traditional Balkan and Easter European filmmaking, it manages to satirize the insensitive and inefficient bureaucratic institutions that are supposed to be there for the citizens.  The film took the top prize at the Sarajevo Film Festival.