Digger

OVERVIEW

The world is on the brink of collapse, and it is all thanks to oil tycoon Digger Rockwell (Tom Cruise), who, despite knowing the risks, pushed his company to keep drilling in Greenland until a methane explosion causes an enormous ice shelf to break away and begin moving toward Europe. If it reaches land, the resulting tsunamis could kill hundreds of thousands of people, leaving Digger, the American government, and scientist Ganesh (Riz Ahmed) desperately searching for a solution. This is Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s eighth feature film, presenting itself as a satire of contemporary politics and corporate power, but might be more than it seems.

BACKGROUND

The film’s idea came to the two-time Oscar winner during the shoot of The Revenant, when warmer temperatures melted snow and affected the production schedule. Originally titled Blah, Blah, Blah before being thankfully renamed Digger, it was first conceived as a much larger disaster movie with considerably more spectacle, but that version collapsed after years of development because of its massive budget and logistics. The project was reworked through the COVID years into the heightened satire that reached the screen. It marks Tom Cruise’s first non-franchise role in almost 10 years, as well as Warner Bros.’ final theatrical release before the studio enters its new era under Paramount Skydance. Originally marketed as a huge Oscar opportunity for Cruise, the marketing grew muted the closer it got to its release. It skipped fall festivals, and its initial reactions were divisive, to say the least.

THE REVIEW

Digger is certainly not a film for everyone. It is a satire, but not particularly funny. It is wacky and loud, but very obvious in its political observations. Like Eddington and Don’t Look Up, it faces the challenge of satirizing something ridiculous on its own (our reality), but it stands apart by going beyond that and landing in similar territory to Darren Aronofsky’s mother!: unsubtle and exaggerated, yet unequivocally bold and fascinating. Messy and heavily dependent on how well you gel with its intentions, but all the more interesting for how fully it commits to them.

One can argue whether the film is purposely unfunny or simply incapable of being funnier, but regardless, it works in its favor, allowing some of its more absurd sequences to retain enough seriousness that parts of the film feel not too different from a spiritual sequel to last year’s House of Dynamite. That is especially true in the sequence showing the President, his officials, and Digger reacting to what ultimately happens in Europe, finding a far better balance between poking fun at reality and capturing the tragedy of the situation than McKay or Aster ever managed. Elsewhere, smaller moments, like the President suddenly realizing there is no woman in the room, or basically anything involving the cat or the priest, are not particularly revealing, but keep being amusing even if never outright funny.

The cast largely plays for the last row, and most of them are very good at embracing the absurdity, even if their performances aren’t as memorable as you’d like. The most memorable is John Goodman, easily the broadest of all. He yells, widens his eyes, and stretches his mouth while talking about his unconventionally placed cancer and its relation to planet Earth. Sandra Hüller, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Emma D’Arcy have considerably less to do, and this is where the film could have made a little more effort to give their characters some specific traits that would make them more memorable.

While Goodman is the most broadly fun, the best actual performance belongs to Riz Ahmed as Ganesh, who finds the best balance between the quirkiness Iñárritu is going for and the grounded reality underneath it. It is still a fairly one-note performance, like most of the film, but Ahmed elevates it through the subtle signs that Ganesh genuinely wants to believe his assumptions about Digger are wrong (and about humanity in general), only to ultimately be proven right. Cruise, meanwhile, is unlikely to receive the Oscar many anticipated from this, but once again proves his enormous commitment to the craft, going along with everything Iñárritu throws at him. His biggest showcase is an extremely complicated long take where Digger unloads one obvious argument after another in an increasingly outrageous way, while kicking a woman and jumping between tables. The scene is equally obnoxious and captivating, but Cruise himself is fantastic.

Not as fantastic as the makeup work that transforms him into an aging Southern oil tycoon, another remarkably convincing job from Kazu Hiro (Darkest Hour, The Smashing Machine), one of the best in the industry. Also deserving of accolades is Dennis Gassner and Richard Johnson’s production design, full of fascinating details that become increasingly curious as the film goes on. Emmanuel Lubezki’s cinematography, meanwhile, is surprisingly unshowy, purposely muted and rarely calling attention to itself despite the entire film being shot in VistaVision. Cosmo Sheldrake’s score, on the other hand, calls plenty of attention to itself through a few (again, purposely) distracting choices.

Where the film misses its mark is in its attempts to truly ground Digger’s character through his relationship with his daughter. It is unnecessarily complicated and makes little impact, becoming more of a disposable distraction than the emotional center that it could have been.

The film’s bigger idea only really comes together once Jesse Plemons delivers a pivotal monologue that contextualizes much of what came before. Curiously, this is where Digger starts connecting with something like last year’s The Secret Agent, particularly in its interest in cinema as a form of historical preservation. Whereas that film argued for the role of cinema in preserving history, Digger complements that idea with the importance of satires, suggesting that our reality has become so absurd that sometimes turning it into a spoof may be the only way to properly capture it. It may be flawed, but it does something seemingly impossible: it makes a convincing case for why the awful Don’t Look Up needs to exist.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Digger may not be as smart, funny, or emotionally complete as it wants to be, but compensates for that with its sheer commitment. It is refreshing seeing such a strange and bold original film presented in such an uncompromised manner. Even when the jokes don’t work or an emotional moment doesn’t quite work, Cruise, Ahmed, and the production design keep us hooked, while its exploration of satire goes to far more intriguing places than its political premise originally suggests. The kind of imperfect film we need more of.

At a glance

3.5/5

“UNCOMPROMISING”

#43 of 205 in 2026 Movies RankedSee the ranking →

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Where to watch

🍿New In Theaters

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