‘Y2K’: SXSW Review

Dir: Kyle Mooney. US. 2024. 93mins

It might have performed like Most Overdrive meets Booksmart, however Kyle Mooney’s overworked, raunchy teen horror comedy Y2K is simply too consumed by the previous to imply something substantial within the current. One last evening within the previous millennium for 2 highschool boys turns lethal when the clock strikes midnight, bringing all of the doomsday fears of a superbug into actuality. The alluring retooling on a standard conceit, this time replete with 90s allusions that run the gamut from ’Thong Music’ to Tipper Gore, by no means develops into an unique story, circling the drain round nostalgic jokes that quickly lose efficiency.   

 Too consumed by the previous to imply something substantial within the current

Y2K premieres at SXSW, after which A24 will hope it satiates the younger cinephile demographic who’ve turn out to be loyal supporters of the studio. That is one other high-concept apocalyptic jaunt aiming to graft the identical individuals who tuned into Our bodies Our bodies Our bodies and turned Every little thing All over the place All At As soon as right into a smash hit. But the movie, written by Mooney and Evan Winter and produced by Jonah Hill, lacks the robust characters of the previous movie and the good world constructing of the latter.  

It begins with a blast from the previous – an AOL emblem on a Mac display screen stuffed with AIM chat home windows belonging to the nerdy Eli (Jaeden Martell), who’s talking with Laura (Rachel Zegler), a preferred lady in school with mad tech expertise who inexplicably occurs to be buddies with this self-described loser. His accomplice in crime is one other amiable teen, Danny (Julian Dennison). Eli and Danny are a heartwarming duo, depicting a close-knit friendship that’s an early spotlight. They’re picked on by everybody from jocks sporting puka shell necklaces to a hip hop gang. One in all their few sanctuaries is a video retailer owned by an area stoner (Mooney) and within the daydreams they conjure of lastly getting laid. 

These early scenes principally survive by way of winking references to the expertise, music, and fashions of the 90s. Even Alicia Silverstone, taking part in Eli’s mum, is amongst these callbacks. When Eli and Danny determine to attend their city’s NYE celebration, we’re lulled into believing this can be a standard ‘one loopy evening’ sort movie. However Y2K peaks by subverting that expectation, turning the home celebration right into a gory, frenetic freakout that includes wonderful Ultimate Vacation spot-degree kills by items of expertise, like a dishwasher or a ceiling fan, which have all of the sudden come to life by the use of a bug and are decided to kill people.

Between the unique designs of robotic monsters and the visceral mixture of digital and sensible results, there’s a welcome playfulness to the bloody onscreen violence. Whereas the scene teases the potential of Y2K changing into a wild, unpredictable thrill trip, a misjudged twist involving a sudden demise causes the movie to lose a essential innocence it by no means regains. 

The screenplay then dithers from one inert set piece to the following. Eli, Laura and their unlikely buddy group enterprise to the disused city manufacturing facility to satisfy up with Laura’s engineer boyfriend (Mason Gooding). They discover relative security there, away from expertise, studying a few central laptop intelligence that’s calling their highschool a house base for its plans of human domination. To avoid wasting the city and presumably the world (it’s by no means wholly clear if different areas are being besieged) the group ventures to the varsity to cease the AI takeover, wandering aimlessly by way of the woods and inflicting this already rehashed premise to grind to an excruciatingly boring tempo.

Throughout Eli and Laura’s journey, the movie struggles to develop their relationship past listlessly hitting regular teenage ‘will they or gained’t they’ beats. Their romance stays insipidly flat and predictable by way of all the run time, regardless of Martell and Zegler possessing actual sincerity. When the largest character progress is everybody studying the favored lady is actually good, you’ve received an issue bigger than a robotic apocalypse in your palms. Mooney additionally spends valuable time that might have been used to develop his characters mugging for the digital camera with a stoner persona that shortly loses its appeal.

Which speaks to the bigger drawback of Y2K – it too usually makes use of good concepts that might have been quick skits as surroundings chewing bits that overstay their welcome with out ever advancing the plot, characters, or world constructing. A Limp Bizkit joke is first run into the bottom, earlier than being squashed, rolled, and misshapen right into a cudgel used to beat viewers into believing any of those protagonists are remotely fascinating. 

It is a nostalgia play composed of admittedly humorous and gnarly moments that don’t string collectively right into a satisfying entire. For a movie about expertise, it has nothing new to say about our dependence upon social media, the escapism of a glowing display screen at our fingertips, or the oncoming spectre of AI. Mooney is merely saying we’re so hooked on our instruments, we’d as nicely be slaves to them. It’s a thought-provoking message that, together with grunge and butterfly clips, misplaced its originality about 24 years in the past.