A few days ago, the Weeknd released Hurry Up Tomorrow, the extremely long and generally impressive new album that's being sold as Abel Tesfaye's farewell to his Weeknd persona. He also ended his Grammy boycott with a surprise performance and announced a stadium tour with Playboi Carti. Nearly two years ago, the Weeknd announced plans for a feature film that'll be tied in with the album release. That movie has reportedly been done for well over a year, and Lionsgate picked it up for distribution last year. The Hurry Up Tomorrow motion picture will arrive in theaters this May, and the first trailer is finally online.
From the looks of things, Hurry Up Tomorrow will work in the same arty pop-star zone as The Idol, the Weeknd's widely derided HBO show. It's directed by Trey Edward Shults, whose last two efforts are Waves and It Comes For Us, and the Weeknd co-wrote it with Shults and Reza Fahim. In the movie, the Weeknd co-stars with Jenna Ortega and Barry Keoghan, two big-name young actors who recently spent time in the Sabrina Carpenter music-video cinematic universe.
Here's how the YouTube description for the Hurry Up Tomorrow trailer sums up the film's plot: "A musician plagued by insomnia is pulled into an odyssey with a stranger who begins to unravel the very core of his existence." You may or may not pick that up from the trailer, a disconnected flood of imagery. The trailer's editing, lighting, and constant screaming make it look like an arty horror picture, and the letters flashing across the screen refer to it as a "surreal cinematic odyssey," which doesn't sound that great to me. But the concert scenes look cool, and I like the bit where Barry Keoghan says that the Weeknd is "fookin' in-vee-incible," so I'll reserve judgment. Watch it below.
The Hurry Up Tomorrow album is out now on XO/Republic, and the movie arrives in theaters 5/16.
