Safe Place Production s.r.o. is a production company that focuses on creating bold documentaries and mini-series on current societal issues, supporting emerging directors, producing feature film debuts, and developing high-quality international co-productions. Our goal is to bring timely, socially meaningful stories that resonate with audiences both at home and around the world.
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Jan Bodnár is a Czech independent producer and publicist. He focuses primarily on the production of feature-length documentary films and miniseries, fiction debuts, and minority co-productions. As a producer, he is behind the award-winning and internationally screened films How I Became a Partisan (dir. Vera Lacková, 2021), From the Bottom (dir. Tereza Vejvodová, 2022), The World According to my Dad (dir. Marta Kovářová, 2023), Dajori (dir. Martin Páv and Nicolas Kourek, 2024), and What About Petey? (dir. Martin Trabalík, 2025), for which he was nominated for the Czech Lion Award in the Best Documentary Film category.
He is also responsible for many media campaigns with impactful reach, such as the viral campaign #LikeYou for META (dir. Martin Páv). He is the founder of the production company Safe Place Production, which aims to bring highly relevant societal topics and stories with the potential to engage Czech and international audiences. His films have been screened in the competitive sections of major international festivals, including Thessaloniki International Documentary Festival, goEast, Sofia International Film Festival, DocPoint Helsinki, MFDF Ji.hlava, One World, and DocudaysUA, among others. He has also participated in leading international industry workshops and training programs, including Ex Oriente, IDFAcademy, Dok.Incubator, ACE Producers Training Days, DocCelerator, BUZZ etc.
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Following the sudden death of his wife, the film’s protagonist, Petr Jochec, must take on the responsibility of caring for his two teenage children: his daughter Vanessa and his son Petey, who suffers from a severe autism spectrum disorder. A widowed father who previously often worked away from home must now take care of his family on his own and keep them together. Although many fathers in such a situation leave their families, Mr. Jochec decides to face this challenge head-on and takes on the daily struggle—from selflessly caring for both children, to providing for the family financially, to managing the household.
The film captures the Jochec family’s struggle to lead a normal life, explores the boundaries of love and parenthood, and shows how individual family members cope with their new and difficult circumstances. The documentary also addresses neglected topics such as the social support system and the lives of caregivers, but above all, it emphasizes the power of human bonds in difficult moments of life. The second feature film by director Martin Trabalík, who himself worked as a personal assistant for several years, is a realistic exploration of life at the limits of social, physical, and emotional possibilities.
What happens to a person when he loses everything overnight?
From the Bottom is a feature-length documentary experiment and a personal investigation by a young social worker who decided to spend a week on the streets of Ústí nad Labem. In doing so, he sought to better understand the reality of his clients. In raw, continuous hidden-camera footage, we witness a wide variety of social interactions, but above all, the sudden shifts in the immediate experience of the main protagonist.
Beyond the Gate is a new feature-length documentary project by veteran director Martin Páv that follows the emergence of a new world in the Ghanaian city of Elmina. At its center there is Czech entrepreneur David Duroň, who, after a major life transformation, leaves the corporate world to “start over”—and, together with the locals, builds the Lemon Beach resort. However, what began as a vision of helping others turns into a story of two worlds colliding, with the resort’s gate serving as their dividing line.
The film’s development was financially supported by the State Audiovisual Fund.
Climate change isn’t just about the weather; it’s about a crisis that is reshaping the world. In three documentary episodes, we follow how water scarcity and climate uncertainty are changing people’s lives from Turkey to the Sahel. We see rivers drying up, fires destroying forests, and young people driven to radicalization by despair. The series connects ecological, political, and social dimensions—from dams altering river flows to migration routes to Europe and the U.S. It also shows the impact on women and children in refugee camps, but seeks solutions and hope: can a sustainable future be found and the model that caused the crisis be overcome? A documentary series about struggle, responsibility, and the values that will shape the future of us all.
The feature-length documentary Underground Professors aims to introduce viewers to a lesser-known phenomenon in our history: the so-called “underground universities” during the Normalization era. This was an illegal educational system that eventually drew in foreign professors—primarily from Oxford, UK—and operated until the Velvet Revolution in 1989. This upcoming film by experienced documentary director Ivo Bystřičan highlights an important historical topic that has not yet been explored on film, while also reflecting on the importance of education and verified information within a (totalitarian) society—a topic that remains highly relevant today.
This feature-length documentary explores how a new generation of Finns is seeking a remedy for isolation and fear. In a society shaped by technology and social media addiction, Pirkko Fihlman (88), a practitioner and teacher of traditional lament singing, offers an alternative way to reconnect with one’s identity and community.
This feature-length documentary captures the city of Kharkiv following the outbreak of war in Ukraine. A city of over a million people on the border with Russia, facing the constant threat of occupation and near-daily Russian attacks. A few days ago, Russian attacks completely cut off the power supply—leaving Kharkiv without heat, electricity, or water. In the face of this reality, the residents of Kharkiv are showing truly heroic resilience. They are literally building new hope from the rubble.
The feature-length documentary The Courage of Reconciliation, directed by Tomáš Kratochvíl and David Butula, seeks to answer a seemingly simple question—who are the Sudeten Germans today?—while also exploring an equally fundamental theme: who are we, the Czechs? Through personal reflections, historical context, and testimonies from representatives of the Sudeten German community, it traces the transformations of identity, memory, and the relationship to home. The Courage of Reconciliation captures the tension between a past marked by expulsion and current efforts toward reconciliation and cooperation.
Surrogacy is a practice in which a woman carries and gives birth to a child for prospective (usually infertile) parents—a child with whom she has no genetic connection. With the rise in infertility, surrogacy and its ethical implications are receiving increasing attention in media and political discourse across Europe.The feature-length documentary RAW is neither a critique of surrogacy nor a mere news report, but an effort to understand and broaden the social discussion, which very often overlooks surrogate mothers and children born through surrogacy. Thus, this film primarily brings visibility to the most vulnerable participants in this practice, gives them a voice, and reveals their perspective to the world.
This feature-length documentary by director Marek Kuboš focuses on the period of so-called “Mečiarism” in Slovakia from 1990 to 1998. The film aims to offer a deeper look at the authoritarian methods of governance, political scandals, human rights violations, and the abuse of state institutions (including the secret service and the media) during that period. The film will also provide testimony regarding Mečiar’s influence on Prime Minister Fico’s governments.
The first spot in the "Our Voice" campaign aims to highlight the need to strengthen Czech language instruction as a second language for all students who currently lack sufficient support in this area and face language barriers. This is especially true for newcomers who start school immediately and, for the most part, do not have the opportunity to learn Czech intensively, even though they desperately need to. Yet each of them has potential.
Special thank to Škola Michael, and Sasha Stelchenko.
The second video for the "Our Voice" campaign focuses on multilingual students and how they often feel isolated, unseen, and unheard at school. They want a space at school where they can share their experiences, work on their emotions, self-worth, identity, and cultural diversity. They need to feel genuinely cared for. Well-being and intercultural sensitivity should therefore be included as topics in every school.
Special thank to Škola Michael, and Sasha Stelchenko.
Meet Ms. Jana, the protagonist of the third video, who talks about the unseen needs not only of multilingual students but also of teachers. Teachers are often not even prepared to answer the question “How are you?” They don’t know how to describe it. They aren’t prepared for the arrival of multilingual children and youth; they are overwhelmed by other responsibilities. They are constantly crushed by the pressure to perform, too much curriculum, a lack of teaching assistants, often little support from administration, and a feeling of inadequate competence. Many of them are at risk of burnout. As a result, support for multilingual children and youth is often pushed to the margins. For teachers to be able to pay attention to the needs of multilingual students and treat them as individuals, they themselves need support and training. And this needs to start at the university level.
Special thank to Škola Michael, and Sasha Stelchenko.
A video presenting the findings of the study Being LGBTQ+ in the Czech Republic 2022. The study was conducted by Michal Pitoňák and Marcela Macháčková from the National Institute of Mental Health in collaboration with Queer Geography. Toward the end of 2022, as part of the Rise Up project, research was conducted on the lives of LGBTQ+ people in the Czech Republic, titled Being LGBTQ+ in the Czech Republic 2022. Data collection took place online, and the findings are currently being compiled into a research report.