Film Review: Hurry Up Tomorrow

Welcome back to the blog readers. One of the films coming out this year that has had my attention is the new film that stars The Weeknd, who I am a massive fan of and have been for 10 years. Hearing he would be making a companion piece to his newest album was going to be interesting, especially since the last cinematic performance he put out was not the best at all. Would this film be an improvement over that slop? Stick around to find out.

Hurry Up Tomorrow was directed by Trey Edward Shults from a screenplay he cowrote with Abel "the Weeknd" Tesfaye and Reza Fahim, based on the album Hurry Up Tomorrow (2025) by Tesfaye. Tesfaye stars as a fictionalized version of himself alongside Jenna Ortega and Barry Keoghan. In the film, a despondent and insomniac Tesfaye who is on the verge of a mental breakdown finds himself being pulled into an existential odyssey by a mysterious stranger.

Like I said, I have loved the Weeknd's music for 10 years now, ever since I heard his song "Earned It" (2015). But that show he did with Lily-Rose Depp, The Idol (2023), was terrible. That was no fault of his own, but he did not feel comfortable saying his lines and doing the things he was doing. And this film is...definitely an experience. It is no Argo (2012), but it certainly is not as bad as Meg 2: The Trench (2023). Tesfaye's performance was better than in The Idol, and Jenna Ortega actually killed it in this film.

I want to start by talking about the Weeknd and his performance. In The Idol, his performance (to be fair, as did everything in that show) fell totally flat. But he was unfortunately unable to convince me he could be a good fit for this role. But there is something about playing himself that feels more authentic to the audience, and especially me. He definitely has improved in a sense from The Idol, but not enough to convince me he can be a world-class actor in the future. I do appreciate him getting to stretch his acting abilities a bit by doing things he probably was not comfortable doing, and he has my respect for that.

But the true MVP of this film has to be the sinister, yet charismatic, performance of Jenna Ortega as Anima. Jenna Ortega has erupted like a supernova as a performer over the last five years, and her roles in Scream (2022), Scream VI (2023), and Wednesday (2022-) are big reasons why. She is becoming a top caliber young actor in our time, and her meteoric ascent is a marvel to watch. This film sees her in total control over her character and her craft, and getting to see her exert that control over a seasoned performer like the Weeknd was absolutely fascinating to watch. She won't win any Oscars for this performance, but I sense one will be in her immediate future.

The story of this film is one that is deeply personal for the Weeknd, but the execution is definitely questionable to me. The film's story (and by extension the album) is the physical manifestation of the things he was feeling after a public incident where he lost his voice at a concert in Los Angeles in 2022. Abel has had relationship issues in the past, so these did not help the situation either. But he is able to turn his grief into art as Jimmy Fallon said in his interview with Tesfaye. My problem is with the execution of the premise. It feels extremely disjointed and lifeless, and does not do an effective job of expressing what it is showing.

And this leads me to the main problem I have with this show. The directing was fine, the editing was fine, the cinematography was fine, but the writing of the film is the biggest offender. This script is probably going to wind up in my top 10 worst scripts of the year because the dialogue is so corny and cheesy, it is incoherent at best, and it is mind-boggingly bad. ChatGPT could have written a better script for this film than Shults, Weeknd, and Fahim. Abel deserves better than what he had with this script, just as bad as The Idol's script was.

In conclusion, Hurry Up Tomorrow wastes a brilliant Jenna Ortega performance with a lifeless and incoherent trip into the Weeknd's psyche that overstays its welcome. Thank you all for reading, and I will see you for the next post.