Year: 2020

Runtime: 81 minutes

Director: Garrett Bradley

By Erica Richards

Documentaries are my favorite genre of film, believe it or not. I find that documentaries are so incredibly unique, even though one could argue they are all the same. Maybe you think if you’ve seen one true-crime documentary, you’ve seen them all–but no! The way the story is told and unfolds is what makes each documentary so attractive to me. How will the filmmakers uncover their story and grab the audience’s attention? I want to learn about something or experience something I have never seen or heard, to gain a new perspective or knowledge on the subject. That is where I feel incredibly torn about “Time”, because it fulfils this in so many ways, yet falls short. 

“Time” is an extremely intimate twenty-year glimpse into Sibil Fox Richardson’s (known better as Fox Rich) life after her husband has been sentenced to sixty-years in prison after they jointly robbed a bank during a desperate moment in their lives; she served three and a half years for her involvement. As a single mother of six, the film consists of home video footage over the course of her and her family’s lives, without her husband and their father. Birthday parties, achievement celebrations, car rides, phone calls, the highs and lows of life are all finished in black and white. This somehow makes the atmosphere of the story more poetic and tragic. 

“The balance of storytelling sometimes struggles throughout the short duration of “Time”, the purpose of the story is there without looking too hard. “Time” is worth a watch, a personal and deep story of love and hope. “

Fox Rich and her family never give up on Rob and fight to get him released from prison. We see firsthand how a family suffers from the corrupt justice system. The tender way the family is shown will indefinitely pull at your heart strings. However, I found myself wanting more. It continuously felt like the story was leading up to something and then never quite got there. I wanted more details, more explanation, more definitive twists and turns. That being said, the realization that this is incredibly raw and a real tale of a family affected by their loved one subjected to a life in prison. This story is not full of shock or mystery. It shows one woman’s incredible commitment to her marriage, her undying love and support for her husband and family. Their love is undeniable, and the payoff of seeing it come full circle is absolutely worth it. 

Narratives are sometimes slow to play out, and documentaries are sometimes so convoluted they become confusing and overwhelming. While the balance of storytelling sometimes struggles throughout the short duration of “Time”, the purpose of the story is there without looking too hard. “Time” is worth a watch, a personal and deep story of love and hope.