Abel Tesfaye (aka The Weeknd) is one of the most important musical artists of the past 15 years. He's currently the most listened to artist worldwide on Spotify and has helped shape pop/R&B music trends since he burst onto the scene with his immense self-released mixtape House of Balloons in 2011. Since he's more or less conquered music, he's now trying his hand at acting and screenwriting. Famously, his first true foray into the field went horribly wrong as The Idol-the HBO series he co-wrote and co-led alongside Lily Rose-Depp-was a complete flop that was canceled after one horribly received season. Around the same time The Idol premiered in 2023, Tesfaye began production on his first movie-which was later revealed to be a companion piece to his latest record Hurry Up Tomorow directed by acclaimed indie filmmaker Trey Edward Shults (It Comes at Night, Waves). What the movie version of Hurry Up Tomorrow does above all else is confirm what was already pretty clear from The Idol: Tesfaye's creative gifts don't translate at all to the screen.
For those of you who haven't dug into the concept of the album version of Hurry Up Tomorrow, it's basically Tesfaye's way of trying to retire the persona of The Weeknd. He feels that fame has amplified his struggle to let go of the most toxic parts of himself (substance abuse, being too absorbed with the glamours lifestyle he's been afforded the opportunity to live to stay in contact with his family or maintain a romantic relationship, etc.) and after a years-long battle, he's finally ready to move past this era of his life for good (hence the title Hurry Up Tomorrow). The record is full of vulnerability and is probably the most relentlessly experimental release he's ever put out, which makes it consistently interesting even when certain songs don't fully hit the mark.
Hurry Up Tomorow's narrative film sibling of the same name is a considerably less effective piece of work. It doesn't commit nearly hard enough to its surrealist elements to work as a mood piece or its psychological thriller/drama elements to be a profound character study and boasts a narrative that is too thin to justify being told via a feature film, which causes it to really meander to the finish line. There are flickers of light present in its hypnotic musical sequences (Chayse Irvin's beautiful 35mm cinematography, which is the best part of the movie by far, shines particularly bright in these moments) and when Jenna Ortega shows up as a depraved fan who intends to go to great lengths to get Tesfaye to be honest about the pain he's going through, but these sparks are too internment to distract from the big ball of nothing this movie is on the whole.
Anybody that is considering checking this movie out as a fan of Tesfaye's or to simply laugh at it after seeing the viral TikTok of the scene featuring Ortega dancing to "Blinding Lights" while Tesfaye is tied to a hotel bed should really think twice before doing so (side note: that scene is actually more ridiculous in the context of the movie and you inconsiderate assholes really need to stop recording the screen in the theater!). It's the rare breed of project that is going to fall short of being even remotely enjoyable for the vast majority of people that watch it, regardless of what lens you choose to view it through. There is just way too much shit out there to watch right now to waste your time with a superstar musician's half-baked vanity project.
Grade: C-
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