Sometimes you see a musical so jaw-dropping that you wish you could
take Ken Mandelbaum to see it.
Unable to bring
myself to watch the much-discussed retooling of whatever exactly The
Idol was (release The Seimetz Cut), I only really know the
cinematic Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye from the part in Uncut
Gems where he plays himself. But honestly, the whole thing that
brought me onboard the Weeknd milieu was 2015’s “The Hills” and
its album Beauty Behind The Madness, because it was a perfect
synthesis of sound and syntax- at that time, a decade ago, Tesfaye
was the Bret Easton Ellis of R&B, and that was cool.
Things have shifted
a bit since then, with the intervening Starboy era, a wry turn on
American Dad!, and the “Young Turks” homage “Blinding Lights.”
And in this transitional space as an artist, and in partnership with
filmmaker Trey Edward Shults (who made the masterpiece Krisha
and a bunch of other, frustrating films- seriously, someone needs to
take his aspect ratios away until he learns that a flourish
ungrounded in artistic philosophy is meaningless), we’re given
Hurry Up Tomorrow, a sleek scream of the soul that aims for
Pink Floyd The Wall, Misery, and Deconstructing
Harry but more often than not wallows in elegantly stage-managed
mess and meticulous explorations of the Isn’t It A Shame About
Crazy Women Who Won’t Understand Me No Matter How Hard I Try
subgenre.
Quite seriously,
this feels way too rooted in visceral paranoia and anxiety not to be
exorcising some real shit, but despite a late third act moment that
is genuinely moving and evocative (perhaps because it benefits from
the contrast of the recursive saywhutnow of the rest of the film),
what you take away from Hurry Up Tomorrow is a sincere concern
that it’s going to someday be used as evidence in divorce
proceedings.
Playing a
fictionalized version of himself, Tesfaye commits to the drama of the
situation. There is no winking at the camera, or ironic distance.
Styled in a way that calls to mind Barton Fink (character
and film), there’s a lot going on, and regardless of how
this film hits you, there is something very appealing about being
able to have an emotional exorcism on this kind of high-end
production-designed scale. Who wouldn’t want to craft something
like this with costars like Jenna Ortega (giving 1986 Jennifer Beals
in the best possible way) and Barry Keoghan (hypersymbolic and
staggeringly underwritten) and then invite your therapist to the
premiere? [NOTE: I don’t know if that’s exactly how it went down,
but you don’t make a film like this and then not get your therapist
to watch it.]
I’d read a lot of
the advance word on this, mostly negative in tone, and bought my
ticket because you don’t want to pass up the chance to see
something that has that kind of impact on the discourse. It’s not a
disaster, and nothing about it is accidental- this is absolutely the
film that all involved parties wanted to make. It’s sometimes
fascinating, sometimes enervating, and absolutely something to behold
in a mall multiplex. And despite what some reviews would have you
believe, this is not The Weeknd’s Under The Cherry Moon*.
It’s his 3 Chains O’ Gold, but using The Sacrifice of
Victor as its foundation**.
* Under The
Cherry Moon is a zippy delight, and absolutely worth a watch.
** The Seimetz Cut
of The Idol and Ezra Edelman’s nine-hour Prince doc are the
two things I want to see more than anything else.
