The Films That Make Us: St. Elmo’s Fire
Jackie and Her Dog
Interviewer: Morgan McCall
Interviewee: Jackie Fischer
I met Jackie Fischer for the first time in 2013. At that time, all I knew is that she had an awesome dog and that she worked at Moberly Area Community College with my mother. Now, I’ve learned so much about her, like how she is an amazing person who is very caring and supportive, her love for dogs is infinite, she can calm anyone down and talk with them to find the right answer, and that she has one of the bests laughs. Ever. Jackie is from Shepherdsville, Kentucky, and enjoys baseball, dogs, yoga, hiking, and spending time with friends. For years we’ve talked about movies, recommending our favorites to each other or talking about new ones that have just been released. A few years ago, Jackie moved to Indiana to be closer to family and started working at Ivy Tech Community College, so I haven’t gotten the chance to see her as much or talk about movies as we once did. This project gave me the perfect chance to catch up with her, learn some more about her, and hear about what movies mean to her.
Did you watch a lot of films growing up?
For films, and watching those when I was growing up it was, we had a tradition that every Christmas Eve we would go to the movie theater to see a movie as a family, and then while we were gone to the movie Santa would come. So that was a huge tradition for us as a family.
Jackie’s copy of St. Elmo’s Fire
What film has had an impact on you?
One, I think through my whole life, that for whatever reason it's one that if it's on TV you know like on the weekend if I'm home if I’m flipping through channels, I’ll always leave it on. And I guess for me it had to do with just the impact of relationships, and that's St. Elmo's Fire. I think it really shows the struggle of young people and really trying to figure out their way but that the importance of friendships and relationships and I mean it covers a lot in a short amount of time you know. As far as anything from addiction to alcoholism to tragedies that people go through, but that those friendships can remain strong through any of that. And I think it's been a pretty timeless movie for me in that whatever age that I'm at to look back on that movie and to just understand, try to understand, what it was trying to portray you know as far as relationships and I don't know, for whatever reason that one has had a big impact.
Demi Moore, Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, Andrew McCarthy, Judd Nelson, Ally Sheedy, and Mare Winningham in St. Elmo’s Fire (1985)
Were there certain parts of the film you connected with?
I think just the dynamic of the complexity of being that age, you know? Your early 20s or late teens, just the confusion around trying to establish a career and trying to balance family expectations with emotions that you might be experiencing with different people, whether they be romantic emotions or anger or frustration that... so I think within each of the characters just showing the struggle that we go through you know? Kind of, I don't know, and I think movies have the capability of doing this for us just kind of normalizing the emotions that sometimes it feels like we're all alone in what we're going through, but when we see other people going through it just helps us, you know? And yeah, to see that other people can go through these challenges and come out okay, but then that, it's been a while since I've seen it but one of the things that kind of really spoke to me is the relationship between two of the characters. Where the best friend likes his best friends, I can’t remember if they were married or just dating but almost like that, and to think about myself and what I was going through it that time and romantic relationships that it’s almost like that someone else had these emotions about someone but had to keep them hidden. Of course, you know in the end, they found out. But just the idea that you either have to suppress your emotions about another person, or you shouldn't be feeling that way about a particular person, I think that really resonated with me during that time.
What is something that you learned from the film? What was the big takeaway?
Just how messy life can be, and that it's going to be, and the importance of relationships. Oh man, I heard a line last night! I started watching on Apple TV The Shrink Next Door, and I listened to the podcast and it's just come out on Apple TV and it's Paul Rudd and Will Ferrell. Will Ferrell’s sister made a comment, you know a lot of it is about family dynamics but she made a comment in the movie that and I wish I would have down exactly as she said it but it was something like “family is just a string of people who you owe apologies to” and to think about the characters in St. Elmo’s Fire they weren’t biological family members, but they were really good friends, you know, and that you stick with. There's a certain group of friends that you're going to stick with no matter what happens, you know, so for me, I think that was the big takeaway and that when we go through hard times that we need to support each other and we need to lean on each other. That's what I liked about it that it didn't shy away from some of the challenges that we go through and pretty intense challenges, but if you have your support group, your system support system in place and they stick with you, that is the importance of that. I mean you just got a feeling that movie that they were going to be lifelong friends regardless of how tough things got for each one of them or within their relationships. I hope they're still friends. (Laughing)
Do you recommend this film to other people?
Oh heck yeah! Yeah. I think it’s a pretty timeless one. Well I mean obviously it's different in that the technology is different, you know, you don't see these characters in their late teens or early twenties on their cell phones or, you know. So things are different just because of the timing of the film, but I think the whole relationship piece in the whole identity, you know, the confusion and complexity around our identity. I think that's pretty timeless.