This week for our featured Letterboxd Lists review we’re exploring one of the newer additions to the “Featured Lists” section. Under “Studios and Collections” we have a List of NEON Films, List of MUBI Films, and rounding out the trio of indie darlings, the list we’re looking at today, List of A24 Films. I chose a recent offering that has been in my watchlist up until now with…Y2K (2024).
Title: Y2K
Director: Kyle Mooney
Released: March 9, 2024 premiered at SXSW, released theatrically December 6, 2024 (Canada and United States)
Runtime: 1 hour 31 minutes
Available to stream on: HBO MAX
Eli (Jaeden Martell) and Danny (Julian Dennison) are trying to decide what they want to do for New Year’s Eve. This isn’t just any regular New Year’s Eve. It’s 1999, this is the final New Year’s Eve of the millennium. Their parents already have plans, so the boys are free to do whatever they can come up with.
While at a gas station, Eli and Danny run into some kids from their high school. One of the girls in the group is Eli’s longtime crush Laura (Rachel Zegler). Danny decides to force Eli into a conversation with her and shoves him in her direction. Laura is playing lookout while her friends steal some booze for a party they’re going to. After watching all of this transpire, Eli and Danny both realize what they have to do for New Year’s Eve…crash that party.
Luckily for both of them, nobody seems to mind that they’re at this party. In fact, Eli saves the day when the music that is playing cuts out. He pulls out a mixed CD from his backpack and pops it in, the party continues, crisis averted.
As the countdown to midnight begins, everyone is ready to enter the year 2000 and finding who they’re going to kiss at the strike of midnight. Well, everyone except for Eli. Instead, he gets to watch Laura kiss Soccer Chris (The Kid LAROI).
Midnight hits and the power flickers but remains on. Everyone jokes that it must have been Y2K that caused the power to flicker. But the laughs are short-lived as screaming can be heard from upstairs. Someone has been killed by a blade from a ceiling fan.
But how?
And more importantly, who?
Y2K (2024) is a movie with a fun premise that can’t figure out what exactly it wants to be.
The first 20-25 minutes are spent setting up a coming-of-age story that has a lot of potential. Two unpopular kids trying to figure out how to spend New Year’s Eve, sign me up. I was even onboard with our main characters. Eli is the hapless and hopeless one while Danny is the comedic relief who helps Eli find his way, cool. Again, sign me up for this movie. Those two had great chemistry together and Dennison is downright hilarious as Danny.
But that isn’t the movie we get. Well, not exactly at least.
Within the next 10-12 minutes, we lose a major character as we take a turn into the horror genre. I am all for a horror comedy when it is a good one. Unfortunately, Y2K (2024) is not one of the good ones. The remaining hour of the movie feels like a drawn out SNL sketch. Given Mooney’s attachment to SNL, having that sort of feel was almost inevitable to some extent.
Not only did Kyle Mooney direct this, he wrote it as well. In more competent and capable hands, I think this had the potential to be one that spread like fire via word-of-mouth recommendations. Once the party scenes are over though, we sort of meander along playing with ideas of horror and comedy but never really seeing them through.
Does that mean that Y2K (2024) is unwatchable?
No, and that can be attributed to the core main characters of Eli, Danny, and Laura. They do the best with what they’re given to work with and are able to get you to invest in, and care about what happens to, the characters.
It also helps that the soundtrack is full of bangers. Well, that and a hilarious throwaway Tipper Gore joke delivered by none other than Fred Durst.
When you have an itch for a nostalgia fix, look no further.
So, have you seen Y2K (2024?
If you have, leave a comment below or reach out on Bluesky and let me hear your thoughts!
As always, you can follow me over on Letterboxd to see what else I’ve been watching lately.