HBO In Production On Documentary Feature About The Y2K Scare, The Computer Glitch That Threatened To End The World At The Turn Of The Century

HBO Documentary Films is currently in production on this documentary "disaster" film, directed by Brian Becker and Marley McDonald and executive produced by Penny Lane and Gabriel Sedgwick. Told entirely through archival material, the documentary will explore how we narrowly averted the largest technological catastrophe to ever threaten humanity, and what, if anything, we learned from it.

Synopsis: Through unprecedented access to never-before-seen archival material, the film explores early-90s caution to late-90s hysteria. Home video and raw footage provide first-hand accounts from computer programmers, doomsday survivalists, militia members, and apocalyptic Christians who grapple with the potential for disaster as the year 2000 approaches. Y2K forced us to consider what would happen if computers worldwide suddenly stopped working when the date changed to 01/01/00 - and even worse, if this failure led to nuclear catastrophe.

The filmmakers are placing an unprecedented call for American home videos from 12/31/99 in partnership with the non-profit Center for Home Movies, whose mission is to share and preserve personal moving images.

Executive Producer Penny Lane quote: "Marley and Brian are incredible talents and it's really gratifying to be able to support their first feature. I can't imagine a better match for me and Gabriel in terms of team, subject matter and creative approach as we foray for the first time into executive producing."

Credits: Directed by Brian Becker and Marley McDonald; produced by Brian Becker; edited by Marley McDonald; executive produced by Penny Lane and Gabriel Sedgwick. For HBO: senior producer, Tina Nguyen; executive producers, Nancy Abraham and Lisa Heller. CAA Media Finance brokered the deal on behalf of the filmmakers.