This is the eleventh installment of BOLD - A University of St. Thomas Podcast, a series that creates a dialogue and aims to inspire, encourage and aid students—current and prospective— to “Be Your Bold Self.” New episodes are published bi-weekly. If you have an idea for a potential podcast guest or topic, send them to Darnell Miller at dmiller@stthom.edu.

Alex Yemeck, host, sits down with Cimela Kidonakis ’09, a UST Alumna and documentary filmmaker to talk about faith, filmmaking, and how UST prepared her for the unconventional career path she has taken. She shares her experience of filming a documentary about the apparitions in Medjugorje, Bosnia and Herzegovina. She also talks about her newest documentary, Where There is Darkness, about a priest who was murdered in Florida. Finally she teases a project she worked on with Gerard Butler.

Watch a video version of the Podcast Here.

Overview:

01:02 - An Introduction to Cimela Kidonakis
01:44 - Houston is the Best City, Go to UST!
03:00 - Discovering storytelling through video production
04:18 - Coming from a family of storytellers
06:20 - How a Liberal Arts Education prepared her for filmmaking
08:48 - Her first two documentaries
10:45 - Cimela’s love for documentaries
13:05 - How faith made it into her films
15:35 - The Apparition in Medjugorje
19:13 - How did you find success in an unconventional path
21:14 - Filmmaking and family
23:25 - Getting a start in professional filmmaking
26:35 - How to fund a documentary
29:05 - Advice to aspiring storytellers
30:55 - What’s next for Cimela Kidonakis

Cimela offered three pieces of advice for aspiring filmmakers:

1. The internet is free.
   There is so much free content on the internet that you can learn from. Take advantage of it.
2. Follow people whose work inspires them.
   Watch them and learn to understand how they tell their stories.
3. Pray.
   What inspires you, why do you want to tell someone's story and is there a good that is going to come from sharing that story?

Check out more of Cimela's work here:

Stella Mar Films