Digger

Wow!

Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárritu’s Digger is being written off as one of the biggest box office flops of all time. That Digger was panned by most major critics certainly didn’t help. The viewers seemed more impressed, but if word-of-mouth was so positive, it wouldn’t have been such a flop. Or would it? There are rumours (from reliable sources) that Digger was intentionally undermined by the fossil fuel industry spreading the word that the film was a dud. I’ll wait to see some definitive evidence, but given the way the fossil fuel industry has knowingly undermined life on the planet for the past century and that it is primarily responsible for the climate change which now threatens our survival (while still pushing for more), it seems all too credible.

Back to the major film critics, who have described Digger as “pretentiously bleak”, “a hate-letter to cinema”, “incompetent”, “ham-fisted”, “lacking any subtext or meaning”, “this movie is to funny what Exxon is to Greenpeace”, “devastatingly bad “, “dated and obvious”, “a shameless ego stroke”, “a garish, cloth-eared and sanctimonious dud”, “a grandiose folly” and, from one of my favourite critics, “pure empty-headed trickery with nothing to say”. 

I didn’t read those remarks before watching Digger, though I’d heard that the critics didn’t like it. Indeed, other than that it was directed by Iñárritu and starred Tom Cruise, that’s literally all I knew about the film before watching it (thankfully, since, unlike You Can See Everything, Digger has some major plot twists). Since I’m not a big Cruise fan and knew the critics disliked the film, why did I rush to Saint John to catch the final screening? Mostly, it was another one of those gut feelings - something I was picking up in the air - that I needed to watch this one. But it was also because of Iñárritu.

I have watched all seven of Iñárritu’s previous films. With the exception of The Revenant, which I disliked because of the way the revenge story was portrayed, I have loved all of his films (two of them, Babel and Birdman, made my top-ten lists) and consider him a master filmmaker.

Whatever the reasons, I’m very glad I got to watch Digger on a giant Cineplex screen, because Digger deserves (needs?) to be seen on a big screen. And because I liked Digger (a Hollywood film, made by Warner Bros.) more than all of the 38 film-festival films I had just watched in Halifax and Edmonton. That was unexpected.

Digger begins by introducing us to Digger Rockwell (Cruise), a wealthy American oil tycoon whose careless attitude to the environment has just caused a major global crisis. It’s not long after that we find ourselves in a board room in Digger’s mansion, where the US president (a terrific John Goodman) and his minions are discussing with Digger how to contain this crisis. It was at this point that I first drew the comparison to Dr. Strangelove, one of my ten favourite films of all time. ‘This is the 2026 version of that classic satire from 1964’, I thought (I hadn’t even known Digger was a satire). ‘With John Goodman as president! This should be fun.” It was! For me, at least.

The first major plot twist occurs not long after the board room scene. I won’t spoil it for anyone who hasn’t watched the film, but I will say that many critics didn’t like it (some did) and that it creates a shift of perspective that might “confuse and alienate viewers” (as one critic says) but for me added originality and depth to the film, making it the classic I think it is destined to become. 

Iñárritu claims he’s not trying to take sides with his satire. I’m not sure what he means by that, but Digger is very clearly a satire warning us against the dangers presented by the fossil fuel industry and a certain kind of president. Contrary to one of the quoted critics, I think Digger is an intelligent thought-provoking film with a lot to say. I won’t say Cruise is the perfect casting choice as Digger, but his excellent performance makes it work. Other members of the cast are likewise outstanding, with a special nod to Riz Ahmed as Digger’s head of environmental safety, Sandra Hüller as Digger’s half-sister and Michel Stuhlbarg as the vice president. The writing, direction and production design are superb, and the ending (which was not a surprise to me) was entirely satisfying.

Mandy Patinkin is not a film critic, but he’s an actor (one of my favourites) and his immediate response to the film (which I posted) was similar to my own, so at least some people were watching the same film. Patinkin describes Digger as “one of the greatest pieces of film I have seen in my entire life”, “an instant classic”, “magnificent” and “ it puts the heart and soul back into the cinema” (contrast with the critic who described it as “a hate-letter to cinema”).

As for me, I think Digger is a wonderful, inventive, brilliantly-structured satire that can stand alongside Dr. Strangelove and will be near the top of my list of favourite films of 2026. ****