Past Film/Video | Documentaries | Series & Festivals

Time Bomb Y2K

(Brian Becker and Marley McDonald, 2023)

Columbus Premiere

 “TIME BOMB Y2K” in block yellow letters stylized to like digital screens surrounded by graphics that look like computer chips.

Break out your floppy discs and dial-up modems because we’re going back to the 1990s!

Told entirely through archival footage, Time Bomb Y2K retraces the turn-of-the-century hysteria over the Y2K computer bug. With never-before-seen footage including home movies and vintage TV network coverage, this archival documentary captures the increasingly panicked worries that computers worldwide would stop working when the date flipped to 01/01/00. Time Bomb Y2K features first-hand accounts from computer programmers, doomsday survivalists, congressional hearings, militia members, public access television teenagers, apocalyptic Christians, and, yes, none other than Matt Damon to convey what it was like to live through that very distinct time. The documentary explores what, if anything, we learned from this turning point in our relationship to technology. (80 mins., DCP)

See the complete Unorthodocs 2023 lineup.

IMAGE CAPTION 
Time Bomb Y2K, courtesy HBO Documentary Films.

"McDonald and Becker brilliantly illustrate how fragile a society we have, less so for its technology than the public discourse."
Stephen Salto, The Moveable Fest

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FILM/VIDEO PROGRAMS MADE POSSIBLE BY
National Endowment for the Arts
Ohio Humanities

ADDITIONAL SUPPORT PROVIDED BY
Rohauer Collection Foundation

WEXNER CENTER PROGRAMS MADE POSSIBLE BY
Ohio Department of Development
Greater Columbus Arts Council
The Wexner Family
Institute of Museum and Library Services
Ohio Arts Council
CampusParc
Ohio State’s Global Arts + Humanities Discovery Theme
The Columbus Foundation
Nationwide Foundation
Vorys, Sater, Seymour, and Pease

ADDITIONAL SUPPORT PROVIDED BY
Mike and Paige Crane
Axium Packaging
Nancy Kramer
Ohio State Energy Partners
Ohio History Fund/Ohio History Connection
Larry and Donna James
Bruce and Joy Soll
Jones Day
Alex and Renée Shumate 

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Past Film/Video

Time Bomb Y2K