.jpg)
A new Christian film called Triumph of the Heart is hoping to inspire audiences, as it has already been a guiding light out of the darkness for the man who wrote it.
Triumph of the Heart is the true story about St. Maximilian Kolbe, a Catholic priest who sacrificed his life in Auschwitz so another man could live.
The film's writer and director, Anthony D’Ambrosio, was deeply moved when he first heard the story, as he found himself in a hard season of life.
“Right now, we're living in a really silent despair,” said D’Ambrosio during the red carpet premiere of the film to The Christian Post. "I think that this culture and what we're experiencing all around us, even though we have perhaps the greatest wealth and the greatest comfort of any civilization ever, we are seeing mental health plummeting, people being unable to find themselves, confused about who they are. I was one of those people."
The film was released in theatres on Sept. 12, 2025, and the premiere was held at the University of Texas in Dallas on Sept. 8.
D'Ambrosio understands deep despair, as a few years ago he was diagnosed with a chronic mold infection that left him with anxiety-inducing insomnia. During some of the sleepless nights, he started writing the story that became the film.
"When I started to write this story, I was seeking a reason to live. I was seeking hope in the midst of my suffering. I hope that this movie and this story can be sort of a love letter to the world, that no matter where you are, no matter what suffering you're going through, no matter how humbled or lost you feel, that God is with you in that place and has hope for you on the other side of it."
In 1982, Pope John Paul II canonized Kolbe as a saint. He gave up his life to save a fellow prisoner in a starvation bunker in Poland run by Nazis.
"I'm still an artist who has freak outs," says D'Ambrosio. "We've been through so many moments of despair, where it felt like this thing was going to fall apart, where there was no way that we were going to make it. And in the midst of all of that, there’s been a massaging of my heart to be able to have faith, to have hope that God is behind me, that God is going to help me no matter what circumstance. As long as I'm faithful and offering myself to Him, God is going to make something beautiful out of that gift of suffering and gift of courage."
The film was entirely crowdfunded by those who believed in the heart behind the project.
"Ultimately, on set, there was always this fighting against the tension between different departments, between [the producer and photographer] and myself, creatively. How do we all love each other first? That's where the battle is won. Can we start with love and then find our way through these stressful and very difficult issues? And I would say that the miracle is that all of us love each other at the end of it, and that is what has allowed this movie to be made."