Across two Oceans: Filmmakers Nicole & Uma capture stories of women in 20s

Nicole Donadio
Blog by invite

The filmmakers are making the story of two strong-minded mid-twenty-year-old women from vastly different cultures and locations by shooting across oceans in two different locations to compare and contrast the stories of women. One of the two filmmakers Nicole Donadio writes the story of her film

My name is Nicole Donadio, a Los Angeles filmmaker who is in the middle of working on a very unique project. Just to give you a little backstory about me, I'm a Film and TV producer in California, where I have worked on such shows as Castle, American Idol, and The Queen Latifah Show to name a few. Three years ago, I created and shot a parody trailer titled, The Women of Wall Street, a spoof on the film The Wolf of Wall Street, where I spun gender roles on their heads, and changed all the male characters to female.

Two women, a film and a continental gap

This video was spotted by Indian filmmaker, Uma Kumarapuram. Uma hails from Thrissur, a small town district in Kerala, India where she currently works as an Associate Director of Photography in Malayalam Film Industry, and as an Assistant Director of Photography in Bollywood. Uma reached out to me, and we ended up bonding over our shared interests in filmmaking, as well as in movies that embody strong female characters. Uma suggested that we team up to make a movie together, I thought it was a fantastic and unique idea, and an opportunity neither one of us could pass up!

We collaboratively wrote a script, but we will each be shooting half the film. Mine in Los Angeles and Uma’s in Kerala. We will be shooting on the exact same camera, similar lens, and the same editing equipment. This will allow each of our shot footage to cut back and forth with one another, without any jarring differences. Once the shooting wraps, all of the footage will seamlessly be edited together to have one united film.

Our film titled Across the Ocean, tells the story of two strong-minded mid-twenty-year-old women from vastly different cultures and locations. Though strangers, each woman strives for something else, a new job, a new home, and most importantly, a new adventure. Nila, a young woman from a small village in Kerala India, imagines escaping her mundane life and pursuing her dream of living in America. After meeting her fiancé through a matrimony website, she hopes he will whisk her away to this idealistic dream world. She unexpectedly finds herself facing challenges that threaten this possibility and the life she had envisioned for herself. Thousands of miles away, Holly, a powerful executive from Los Angeles seems to have it all, the boyfriend, the job, the family, but something is missing. When an opportunity arises for a dream job in India, she struggles between facing her fears or staying in the safety and comfort of home. Even though a world apart, each woman deals with very similar hesitations and decisions. Ultimately, they both come to the realization that the only thing stopping them may not be their jobs, their friends, or families, but themselves.

We are both very excited to take on this feature length film, and to bridge a gap between two countries, as well as make this collaborative film in such an incredibly unique way! We are currently raising money through a Kickstarter campaign and posting updates on our film page.