{"id":924122,"date":"2026-10-07T14:44:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T14:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/924122\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T14:44:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T14:44:14","slug":"review-fine-lets-talk-about-digger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/924122\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Fine, let’s talk about Digger"},"content":{"rendered":"

I found the trailer<\/a> for Digger intriguing, starring a nearly unrecognizable Tom Cruise and giving off strong Doctor Strangelove vibes. Plus, it is four-time Oscar-winning director Alejandro G. I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s (Birdman<\/a>) first English-language film since 2015\u2019s The Revenant. Those elements quickly moved it near the top of my \u201cmust-see\u201d list even if details about the actual plot were lacking. Given I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s\u00a0pedigree, the film seemed poised to be prime Oscar bait.<\/p>\n

(Major spoilers appear below the gallery. We\u2019ll give you a heads-up when we get there.)<\/p>\n

By now it\u2019s clear that Digger is on track<\/a> 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 I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s bold, creative swings and others finding the film practically unwatchable.<\/p>\n

Count me among the film\u2019<\/a>s unabashed champions<\/a>, even though Digger turned out to be nothing like what I expected. It\u2019s closer to absurdist theater than satire or dark comedy, and it\u2019s not the Doctor Strangelove of climate change. This is a film that doesn\u2019t just challenge the viewer; it deliberately keeps the audience off-balance, its excesses pushing the boundaries of one\u2019s patience at times\u2014and then I\u00f1\u00e1rritu sticks the landing with a savagely moving third act in which the final pieces of his vision fall into place.<\/p>\n

That said, it\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

I\u00f1\u00e1rritu had the idea for Digger the character shortly after wrapping The Revenant. \u201cI knew who this character was,\u201d he told Variety<\/a> back in July. \u201cI knew how he spoke, how he survived, how he seduced reality into agreeing with him.\u201d Initially the project was being developed at Netflix with Leonardo DiCaprio as a possible star; Netflix opted to make Don\u2019t Look Up with DiCaprio instead. (Some have compared Digger to Don\u2019t Look Up; apart from a climate theme, they are very different films.) But the idea piqued Cruise\u2019s interest; the actor was a longtime fan of the director. And thus Digger was born.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I found the trailer for Digger intriguing, starring a nearly unrecognizable Tom Cruise and giving off strong Doctor…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":924123,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[49,48,75],"class_list":["post-924122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/924122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=924122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/924122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/924123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=924122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=924122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=924122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}