Review: Fine, let's talk about Digger

I found the trailer for Digger intriguing, starring a nearly unrecognizable Tom Cruise and giving off strong Dr. Strangelove vibes. Plus, it is four-time Oscar-winning director Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s (Birdman) first English-language film since 2015’s The Revenant. Those elements quickly moved it near the top of my “must-see” list even if details about the actual plot were lacking. Given Iñárritu’s pedigree, the film seemed poised to be prime Oscar bait.

(Major spoilers appear below the gallery. We’ll give you a heads-up when we get there.)

By now it’s clear that Digger is on track to be one of the biggest bombs of the year instead, racking up a mere $20 million globally its opening weekend, against a $125 million (possibly more) budget. It has sharply polarized critics and audiences alike, with some appreciating Iñárritu’s bold, creative swings and others finding the film practically unwatchable.

Count me among the film’s unabashed champions, even though Digger turned out to be nothing like what I expected. It’s closer to absurdist theater than satire or dark comedy, and it’s not the Dr. Strangelove of climate change. This is a film that doesn’t just challenge the viewer; it deliberately keeps the audience off-balance, its excesses pushing the boundaries of one’s patience at times—and then Iñárritu sticks the landing with a savagely moving third act in which the final pieces of his vision fall into place.

That said, it’s also the kind of film destined to irritate, if not outright alienate, a solid faction of the audience. I get why plenty of people dislike Digger so intensely, even if I came to the opposite conclusion.

Iñárritu had the idea for Digger the character shortly after wrapping The Revenant. “I knew who this character was,” he told Variety back in July. “I knew how he spoke, how he survived, how he seduced reality into agreeing with him.” Initially the project was being developed at Netflix with Leonardo DiCaprio as a possible star; Netflix opted to make Don’t Look Up with DiCaprio instead. (Some have compared Digger to Don’t Look Up; apart from a climate theme, they are very different films.) But the idea piqued Cruise’s interest; the actor was a longtime fan of the director. And thus Digger was born.

Beware of Judy

The film opens with Digger waking up to find his decrepit cat, Maggie, at death’s door. His frenetic morning gets worse from there, when there is an explosion at his company’s drilling operation to extract oil in Greenland, thanks to all that methane under the ice. This dislodges an ice shelf the size of Maryland (nicknamed Judy) and sets it on a collision course with the coast of Norway—a disaster that would see massive tidal waves destroying much of the European coast. He conspires with US President Compson (John Goodman) to keep the news from getting out (there’s a small chance it could melt away in the Atlantic instead), thereby delaying any evacuations.

WARNING: Major spoilers below.

Digger Rockwell (Tom Cruise) frets over his dying cat as disaster looms in Greenland. Warner Bros.

Then comes the film’s big twist: as Digger and Compson are gazing out into Digger’s garden, the camera pulls back to reveal they are standing on a stage set. Cruise is actually playing an actor, Curtis Markson, who in turn is portraying Digger Rockwell in a satirical play called Fossil Fools. Compson and the others we’ve seen thus far are actors too, and this is the final dress rehearsal before opening night. Curtis is not entirely happy with the creative decisions of the play’s director, Hannah (Sophie Wilde). He’s also worried about his daughter, whose whereabouts are unknown after she boarded a plane from Jamaica with a “Category 6” hurricane brewing.

Digger’s colorful set design is aptly “stage-y,” somewhat reminiscent of a Wes Anderson film, only more faded and worn around the edges, with the odd patch of mold. And the director has assembled a terrific cast.

But this is Cruise’s star vehicle, and his performance is phenomenal—on par with 1999’s Magnolia. I’ve always found Cruise rather irritating as an actor, but he’s grown considerably since his Risky Business and Top Gun days. He switches easily between Digger’s loud, swaggering, cartoonish personality and the anxiety-ridden Curtis beset by opening night jitters and growing concern for his daughter. Cruise has received multiple Oscar nominations but never won, and his transformative turn as Digger Rockwell is certainly Oscar-worthy (although the critical backlash could dash those hopes, which would be a shame).

Granted, the play rehearsal segments are dialed to 11, but this is clearly by design. Curtis even echoes several criticisms leveled at Iñárritu’s film: The caricatures are too broad, the “jokes” aren’t quite landing, and Hannah seems to be more interested in creating an auteur theater production than a crowd-pleasing comedy. Curtis’ discomfort, and ours, builds to a tense crescendo during Digger’s bombastic speech in front of the European Parliament. Iñárritu has described this 10-minute monologue as the “spine” of the film—apparently he wrote 70 versions—but it’s frankly a little too ham-fisted, even for the play-within-a-film, and goes on a bit too long.

It’s Jesse Plemons’ Kenny who turns out to be the film’s secret heart. We only see Kenny in brief interactions until the final act, when he breaks up Hannah and Curtis’ latest creative squabble with a powerful speech of his own. Kenny isn’t just any financial backer; he turns out to be the real Digger Rockwell’s nephew. Kenny confirms what has been hinted throughout: We are 25 years past the devastating events being satirized in the play, and the world is now a dystopian hellscape.

For Kenny, it doesn’t matter whether the play is a comedy, a tragedy, a farce, or something else entirely. It doesn’t matter if it’s historically accurate or particularly funny. That was never the point. Everyone venturing out to the theater on opening night lost loved ones in the global tragedy. His uncle Digger became the avatar of their grief and rage over their ruined lives. Kenny bought the rights and revived Fossil Fools to give people a cathartic outlet in which to mourn that loss—by laughing and cheering through their pain at the final fate of this hated figure.

Digger might boast an A-list star, but it’s not a commercial film by any stretch. Its modest box office take would be considered pretty solid by arthouse standards, if it weren’t for that hefty production budget. (Frankly, that miscalculation is entirely on Warner Bros.) Perhaps if it had been marketed as a quirky arthouse film, critical expectations might have been tempered and the naysayers’ assessments a bit less savage. That said, Iñárritu has always been a staunchly uncompromising director when it comes to his artistic vision. This is the man who made the two-and-a-half-hour, stream-of-consciousness passion project Bardo (2022), after all, which several critics also found rather abrasive and self-indulgent.

Los Angeles Times reviewer Amy Nicholson admitted, “While I don’t entirely love this strange comedy, I’m giddy that it’s lurched into existence.” Well, I do kinda love this prickly, imperfect, audacious film, largely because I was still pondering its themes and Iñárritu’s objectives several days after the screening. That’s exactly what art is supposed to do. Besides, cinematic history is rife with critical and financial bombs that became beloved cult classics—Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner chief among them. Only time will tell, but I suspect Digger might join their ranks.

Jennifer is a senior writer at Ars Technica with a particular focus on where science meets culture, covering everything from physics and related interdisciplinary topics to her favorite films and TV series. Jennifer lives in Baltimore with her spouse, physicist Sean M. Carroll, and their two cats, Ariel and Caliban.