Time Indefinite

Time Indefinite is a 1993 autobiographical documentary film directed by the American filmmaker Ross McElwee. The film is a deeply personal continuation of McElwee’s diary-style documentary practice and explores themes of grief, mortality, chance, faith, denial, and the ethical distance created by filming one’s own life. Shot primarily on 16 mm film with McElwee himself as narrator, cameraman, and central subject, the documentary reflects on how individuals confront death and uncertainty while continuing to live, love, and create.
The title Time Indefinite is derived from a biblical phrase spoken by a visiting Jehovah’s Witness during an encounter McElwee records on camera. Preoccupied with adjusting exposure to capture light across the man’s face, McElwee only registers the phrase moments after it is spoken. He later interprets it as referring to the unknowable and unpredictable imminence of death, a concept that becomes central to the film’s structure and meaning.

Background and Context

Ross McElwee is known for pioneering a form of personal, first-person documentary filmmaking in which the filmmaker’s life, thoughts, and relationships form the primary subject matter. Time Indefinite follows and expands upon his earlier film Sherman’s March (1986), continuing his exploration of how private experience intersects with broader existential questions.
The film was produced during a period of profound personal upheaval for McElwee, marked by multiple deaths within his family and close circle, as well as moments of renewal and hope. Rather than presenting a linear narrative, Time Indefinite unfolds episodically, mirroring the unpredictable rhythms of life itself.

Synopsis and Narrative Structure

The documentary opens with Ross McElwee getting married to his wife, Marilyn, an event that finally brings reassurance to his family, who had long worried about his personal stability. This moment of apparent closure and happiness is quickly followed by a sequence of losses that shape the emotional core of the film.
McElwee’s grandmother dies, and shortly thereafter Marilyn suffers a miscarriage. Within a week of this loss, McElwee’s father, a medical doctor, dies suddenly and unexpectedly. These events are particularly significant given that McElwee’s mother had died of cancer a decade earlier, leaving him to confront once again the fragility of family continuity.
Following his father’s death, McElwee returns to his father’s house, where he encounters his father’s housekeeper. She speaks to him about Christianity and faith, offering religious explanations and consolation that McElwee receives with quiet ambivalence. These conversations highlight the contrast between religious certainty and McElwee’s own more tentative, observational approach to meaning.
The film then turns to McElwee’s long-time friend Charleen, who is now living alone in a new apartment. Her past life is revealed through recollection: she and her husband once lived together on a remote island in a two-storey house abandoned by the United States Army. The couple painstakingly restored the house and lived there for years before becoming estranged. Charleen remained alone in the house after the separation, but upon returning from a trip, she discovered that her husband had set fire to the house and died downstairs at the grand piano in an act of arson-suicide.
Charleen keeps her husband’s cremated remains in a bag inside a box. Although she attempts to dispose of them, she finds herself unable to do so. Her inability to part with the remains becomes a powerful symbol of unresolved grief and the persistence of emotional attachment even after profound trauma.

Medicine, Denial, and Mortality

Another significant strand of the film involves McElwee’s brother, a successful medical doctor. During a visit to his brother’s practice, Ross discusses their father’s sudden death and the shock it caused them both. The conversation underscores the irony that even medical expertise cannot provide protection from mortality or foresight into death.
While Ross is present, his brother examines a female patient who has a large malignant tumour on her breast. The woman has lived with the tumour for years without seeking medical treatment. The tumour has spread extensively and appears multifaceted and multicoloured. McElwee incorporates footage of the consultation and a slide of the tumour taken for medical records into his film.
In voiceover, McElwee reflects on motivation, fatality, and the psychological power of denial, marvelling at how individuals can ignore even the most obvious signs of danger. This sequence forms one of the most unsettling moments in the documentary, juxtaposing clinical observation with deeply human vulnerability.

Interruption and Continuation

At one point, McElwee abandons the film altogether, overwhelmed by the accumulation of death and uncertainty. However, the project resumes later when Marilyn becomes pregnant again. This development introduces a counterpoint to the earlier losses, shifting the film’s emotional tone without negating its underlying sense of fragility.
The pregnancy comes to term, and Ross and Marilyn become parents to a baby son. They visit Charleen together, bringing the child with them. Charleen criticises the couple for bringing a child into what she perceives as a hostile, unpredictable, and dangerous world. Her criticism is not presented as bitterness but as a deeply felt response shaped by her own experiences of loss and betrayal.
Despite this, Charleen also speaks to the passion that drives life and procreation, acknowledging the force that compels people to continue despite uncertainty. Ross and Marilyn are shown doting on their son, largely untroubled by the criticism, suggesting an acceptance of risk as an inherent part of living.

Themes and Interpretation

Time Indefinite is centrally concerned with the tension between observation and participation. McElwee repeatedly reflects on how filming events can create a sense of emotional distance, allowing him to witness life rather than fully inhabit it. At the same time, the camera becomes a tool for survival, enabling him to process grief and make sense of loss.
The film also explores randomness versus meaning, contrasting religious explanations, medical rationality, and personal reflection. Death arrives without warning, pregnancies fail and succeed unpredictably, and human beings respond with denial, faith, or acceptance.
Another recurring theme is continuity. Despite repeated confrontations with mortality, life persists through relationships, memory, and childbirth. The final sections of the film suggest not resolution, but an ongoing negotiation with uncertainty.

Reception and Legacy

Time Indefinite was widely praised for its honesty, emotional depth, and innovative documentary form. It is regarded as one of McElwee’s most accomplished works and a landmark in autobiographical cinema. The film appeared on year-end lists, including being ranked third by Peter Rainer of the Los Angeles Times.
The documentary is frequently studied in film courses for its use of first-person narration, ethical engagement with subjects, and exploration of grief without sentimentality. It remains an influential example of how documentary film can function as both personal diary and philosophical inquiry.