Digger

 

This review may contain spoilers!

Digger is a political satire showing a rendition of the life of billionaire and fuel tycoon Digger Rockwell. When Digger's oil drilling platforms create a severe ecological disaster, the whole world pays for it.

It has been a while since I've seen the highly creative talent of Alejandro G. Iñárritu guide a film, and this felt a lot like revisiting the theatrical nature of Birdman. Digger is by nature a performance film, something theatrical that plays up its own sense of satire. This is a film that presents to you a ridiculous calamity that is walked through by moronic individuals who caricature real-life billionaires and political giants. Yet, Digger is about finding truth in tragedy; mimicking the absurdity of these events in pantomime so that the relatable blow is light enough to be swallowed. This is a film that has been mired in speculation, with people wondering what the other aspect of this nutty feature is. The twist that Digger is a performance within a performance isn't especially rewarding; having a moment of reality swirling around an actor's personal fear for his family takes some punch out of the piece. There is a brief glimmer when Cruise breaks scene and argues with Wilde, a scene that really is quite revelatory when it comes to what Plemons has to bring to the feature. Ultimately, the film sort of shrugs and reminds you that this is all show, meandering through a false messiah third-act piece that captures Rcokwell's fall from grace and then hits us with a sci-fi dystopian end that just seems a bit heavy-handed. Digger is a script that proves very daring, but really struggles to maintain a compelling narrative throughline.

I must admit that while I didn't care much for the narrative structure of Digger, I felt it really had some important messaging to say. This is a feature that quite adeptly holds a mirror to the capitalist cowboys that are so often at the head of the ship. Positioning billionaires as leading presidents, watching a political theatre play out as a circus, it even managed to position a personal minister to the president, mirroring the announcement of a similar role in the USA this past week. Digger himself leads a very sheltered life full of falsehoods and luxuries that he clings to. You watch him calculate and consider how he can defer, lie or bully his way out of things going from bad to worse, while staying financially in the green. Even the unnatural way Digger keeps his suffering, dying cat alive is a strong symbol of Digger serving his own needs before others. There's something played for comedy in this that could be harrowingly real; that is the moment in which an internet firewall prevents warnings and reporting of news about a cataclysmic tsunami caused by an American oil rig operation. The scale of secrecy and self-serving deceit feels cartoonish, and yet it only feels a few shades apart from reality.

This script often feels annoyingly at war with itself, with some exceptionally good themes to speak to. It's a massively unique swing in amongst the line-up of 2026 features; it's certainly the most unique thing Tom Cruise has done in years. I was so entirely impressed with him as Rockwell and Markson. You felt that he had such brash bravado as Digger, a greed that presents as all-consuming. His speech to the World nations is a wild ranting rave of a monologue that will remind just how much versatility Cruise actually has. This is a powerhouse, reminding us that if he were in the Oscars race every year, we'd have some fascinating work on our hands. Cruise isn't the only one acting up a storm in this. I've already mentioned the incredibly grounding performances of Plemons and Wilde, who guide the twist aspect of this film. Riz Ahmed's work as Ganesh is something staggering. Ahmed is a scene partner the likes of whom Cruise hasn't rallied against in a long time. This is truly an ensemble piece, and it's made by people like Stuhlbarg, Burke, Kirrane and Mullion all quietly propping this thing up. There are also moments where things go staggeringly too far; I could not take Goodman's president parody and felt it jumped the shark. Sandra Hüller, meanwhile, struggled to connect to anyone else and seemed like an island alone in this feature.

I admire Iñárritu's work and style most of the time, but I often grappled with Digger. There's a clear sense of theatricality to it, but I don't really believe that it begot a visually striking film. There are a few nice visuals, but the constant attempt to 'stage' the camera and give the piece a theatre quality resulted in some average framing and washed-out shots. The moments where special effects were implemented really looked the part, resulting in some transporting scenes. I also thought the film score could barely be called such. This is an array of noise that screeches at the audience. 

It's a pity that Cruise's most ambitious project in years doesn't quite know how to stick the landing. I would give Digger a 4.5/10.