Hurry Up Tomorrow Trailer: The Weeknd Channels Stephen King for New Movie

It’s a little unclear what The Weeknd is going for in Hurry Up Tomorrow, but the trailer definitely shows some inspiration from Stephen King. The trailer for this musical psychological thriller dropped on Wednesday, showing Abel Tesfaye starring in a feature-length film based on his own studio album. It’s hard to interpret the story itself, but scenes like Tesfaye lying helpless in bed while Jenna Ortega looms over him definitely reference other iconic horror movies like Misery. Hurry Up Tomorrow hits theaters on May 16th, so we’ll get more insight then. In the meantime, The Weeknd’s album is already streaming.

Hurry Up Tomorrow was written by Tesfaye, Reza Fahim, and Trey Edward Shults, and directed by Shults. Tesfaye plays a fictionalized version of himself on “an existential odyssey” with “a mysterious stranger.” It looks like the movie will be pretty surreal and impressionistic, but some of the stand-out moments in the trailer are references to other horror movies — particularly adaptations of King’s work. In addition the Misery connection above, there are some eerie closeups and set pieces reminiscent of The Shining, for example.

The trailer comes days after the release of Tesfaye’s sixth studio album. The movie will reportedly be based on the album, but that doesn’t make for very straightforward predictions. Listeners have a few months to make interpretations, but so far, critics have described the album as self-referential and existential, exploring themes of rebirth and redemption.

Tesfaye himself named some influences on the album, including movies — though none of King’s adaptations made the cut. He said that the scores of Midnight Express and Scarface had a big impact on this this work, both composed by Giorgio Moroder. He also called this the end of a trilogy starting with his last two albums, and compared the whole thing to Dante’s Divine Comedy.

Hopefully the film can live up to all those lofty comparisons. Tesfaye took a lot of criticism for his last outing as an actor — his HBO original series The Idol. Tesfaye starred as a sleazy con man, and he reportedly steered the story towards more “degrading” and sexual content. The show was a flop, with much of the blame falling on Tesfaye himself. Some reports said that he was behind a “creative overhaul” on the show in the middle of production, which is when director Amy Seimetz left the project.

Hurry Up Tomorrow premieres in theaters on May 16th. The album is available now on most major music streaming services.