It’s been said that Tom Cruise is the last true movie star in Hollywood. Cruise has been active now for over 40 years in the business, and is showing no signs of slowing down, even as he starts to head towards retirement age. Now at the age of 64, Cruise is still putting himself in death-defying action sequences that test his physical abilities, choosing to do as much of his own stunt work as he can. And it’s helped to keep him relevant in the public’s eye, even as most of his peers have begun to slow down. It was only a 4 short couple years ago that we saw Tom Cruise achieve his biggest box office success ever with the mega-hit Top Gun: Maverick, and in the next couple of years we are going to see him again take to the skies in another Top Gun sequel, as well as go behind the wheel again in a Days of Thunder sequel. But as fun as all these action films may be, there’s one thing that has long been absent in his resume, and that’s a performance in a non-action movie. We’ve seen a lot of Tom Cruise the movie star, but not enough of Tom Cruise the actor. And here’s the thing, we know he can act, and act very well. Some of his best work has not been in action movies, but rather in more serious films like Born on the Fourth of July (1989), A Few Good Men (1992), and of course Jerry Maguire (1996). We’ve seen Cruise spend so much time running, jumping, and punching in these Mission: Impossible movies over the last decade, that we forget that there is this other side to him. It’s perhaps that he’s been less inclined to move outside of his comfort zone in recent years, and has been more interested in testing his physical limits on the big screen more than his acting chops. But, we know they are still there. Even in action mode, Cruise still delivers some solid performances and he’s always a charismatic presence in every movie he makes. What would be preferable is if he added more variety to his filmography; a little drama or comedy mixed in with all the action tentpoles. In addition, he should also look towards working with more prestige directors, who would be able to bring that thespian side out of him more.
As shown before, there was a time when Cruise was able to work with prestige filmmakers, even while his star was rising. He’s gotten to work with Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone, and Paul Thomas Anderson throughout the years, all Oscar-winning filmmakers. But one thing that’s changed in the last couple decades or so is that Cruise has taken on more of a leadership role in the movies he makes. He’s been the producer as well as the star of the Mission: Impossible and Top Gun movies, and as producer he’s also been the creative driving force as well, meaning that he’s been very selective of the filmmakers he’s chosen to work with. Now, the filmmakers he’s chosen to make these movies have been Christopher McQuarrie and Joseph Kosinski, both very accomplished and skilled filmmakers, but they are also filmmakers that defer a lot of creative control over to Cruise in the process of making these movies. As a result, Cruise probably is not the kind of actor that checks his ego at the door to conform to the demands of a more auteur filmmaker. It’s probably why he hasn’t worked with the likes of Christopher Nolan, Quentin Tarantino, or Wes Anderson; filmmakers who make their movies in a very specific way that does not leave much room for a movie star like Tom Cruise to take over. But, then again, there was a time when Tom Cruise would go out of way to accommodate his schedule if it meant working with one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. Cruise and his then wife Nicole Kidman famously spent nearly a full year filming what would be the legendary Stanley Kubrick’s last film, Eyes Wide Shut (1999). This of course happened at a time when Cruise was in less control of the movies he was in, but it also shows that he was capable of being accommodating to the filmmaker’s preferred process. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen Cruise bring his talents as an actor to a film that is far more filmmaker driven, but surprisingly that very thing has finally happened again this year. To the surprise of many, we learned that Cruise would be teaming up with Alejandro G. Iñárritu, the Oscar winning filmmaker behind Birdman (2014) and The Revenant (2015) for a new film. Iñárritu is another filmmaker with a specific way of making movies, so the fact that Cruise was willing to work with him was a great sign that he was indeed ready to tap back into his more thespian side and actually show off his acting skills once again. The only question is, did the experiment work or did the movie manage to miss as both an acting showcase and as a filmmaking exercise.
The movie Digger tells the story of an oil baron named Digger Rockwell (Tom Cruise), who lives in the laps of luxury with his cat Maggie, who is barely clinging onto life. Digger has been able to become the largest oil producer in the world thank to his collusion with the President of the United States, President Compson (John Goodman), who has allowed Digger to expand his operations into arctic regions such as Alaska and Greenland. While his company is drilling in Greenland, Digger’s equipment breaks open a methane pocket trapped under the ice, and this cause a massive crack in the ice shelf. Suddenly, a land slide sends a massive chunk of the ice shelf three times the size of Washington D.C. into the ocean water, with the currents carrying it into the North Sea. Now, because of the activities of Digger’s company, the northern coasts of Europe are facing catastrophic flooding and damage from this giant iceberg, leading to the deaths of hundreds of thousands and costs of trillions of dollars to the economies in the region. In an attempt to divert attention away from their own incompetent oversight, Digger and President Compson look ways to spin the disaster to their advantage. Digger tries to push forward the idea that he alone will be the savior of the world, even while his own business is making these kind of disasters more common. Digger’s ignorance of the true situation puts him more at odd with his sister Emma Rockwell (Sandra Huller), who has been spear-heading a more green energy initiative with their family wealth, and raises the concerns of the head of his company’s environmental safety, Dr. Ganesh (Riz Ahmed). But even despite all of the misinformation that Digger and the Compson administration has been spreading, the disasters still happen, and Digger becomes more and more of a pariah in the eyes of people across the world. In addition, President Compson is having his own battle with cancer, which is leading him to become more delusional and desperate. When it becomes know that another massive ice shelf has detached and is making it’s way across ocean waters towards the Alaskan Coastline, things potentially could become even worse, as the nuclear option is put on the table. How will the world manage to survive when the fate of humanity rests in the hands of these egotistical men who put their own well-being ahead of what’s best for the rest of the world.
Alejandro G. Iñárritu is a very interesting filmmaker. His filmography has been made up of a wide variety of movies, from films made with gritty realism like Babel (2006) and The Revenant (2015), to movies that are wildly experimental like Birdman (2014) and his last film Bardo (2022). One thing about Iñárritu that remains consistent is the fact that he never makes the same kind of film twice; he’s always looking to try something different with his next film. With Digger, he’s definitely wading into his more surreal mode, telling this cautionary tale about egotism and climate change within a very heightened world. From the performances to the production design, this is a movie that very much is not meant to be reflective of the real world. And that is largely the point of the film. When watching the movie, Iñárritu makes a point of the artifice of it all, and it actually become a plot point in the film itself. But, in making this a very experimental movie that draws attention to it’s own artifice, Iñárritu certainly runs the risk of alienating some of his audience. Digger is undoubtedly going to be a polarizing movie, with people either loving it for it’s originality, or hating it for it being aggressively unconventional. Where I myself fall on the spectrum of critical opinion of this movie is unfortunately on the negative side, but with some nuance to my reaction to this movie. I ultimately did not enjoy the overall experience of watching this movie, as I felt a lot of the eccentricities became a little too much and got in the way of the cinematic experience. At the same time, there is still a lot to admire about the movie, and at times the movie comes very close to achieving brilliance. My opinion of this movie may even change over time, swaying one way or the other, but upon first watch, I found myself coming away feeling like the movie fell well short of how I wanted it to be. What I think may be at the core of what makes or breaks the movie for most people is when a big twist is revealed about 40 minutes into the film. It’s here where we learn exactly why this story is being told in such a heightened way, with all of it’s oddball exaggeration. For me, I admire the idea behind the plot twist but I feel that it also acts as a cop out for the filmmaker. Strangely enough, I feel like I could have done without the explanation and just have the movie stick to the act that it had initially set up.
What the twist ends up doing that I feel damages the movie experience as a whole is that it segments the movie in a way that I feel breaks the rhythm that the movie is going for. I was hoping that the movie would commit to the farce completely, but the film for some reason seems to hedge it’s bets unnecessarily. The film clearly wants to say something bold about climate change, and do so in a way that evokes how Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove (1964) tackled the fears of nuclear war. But in drawing attention to the artifice, I feel like the movie undermines the message and loses it’s way. It’s unfortunate, because there are points when this movie really comes close to achieving brilliance. There’s a scene when the character Digger gives a speech to the European Union that may be one of the best scenes that I have seen all year. It’s an incredible 10 minute long monologue delivered by Cruise as the character, and most of it is done in a one-shot, with the actor throwing himself physically and fully into the performance. I wish so much that more of the movie had risen to the level of this scene. This would normally have been the moment for an Oscar’s highlight reel, but it will likely be buried underneath all of the discussion over why this movie did not land with most people. I should note that there is nothing embarrassingly bad about this movie. This isn’t as cringe-inducing of a big swing that misses such as something like Babylon (2022) or Joker: Folie a Deux (2024). When Iñárritu misses in this movie, it’s still an impressive attempt. The movie is wholly well crafted and is taking bold risks. But the sum of the parts just doesn’t come together the way it should, and that ultimately leads to it falling short for someone like me. I can go along with some weird choices in movies, but in the end I have to enjoy the experience of watching the movie and not feel like I only get that experience periodically. Digger is a testing experience and I feel like a large part of the audience is likely going to reject it in the end, mainly because it is an unforgiving movie if you aren’t on board with it’s conceit.
One of the things that I can unequivocally say is a positive about the movie are the performances from the cast. Everyone in the movie very much is on board with the absurdity on display; especially Tom Cruise himself. It’s been way too long since we’ve seen Tom Cruise actually attempt to play a character so wildly different from his own public persona. He’s had this talent all along, but has never really allowed himself to display these kinds of acting chops. We got a little taste of it in Ben Stiller’s satirical Hollywood comedy Tropic Thunder (2008), where Tom Cruise appeared as a grotesque parody of a studio executive named Les Grossman. Buried under a fat suit and facial prosthetics, Cruise was allowed to fully disappear into this character and actually show off his acting range, even if it was in a screwball comedy. That version has been lying dormant for nearly 20 years, and finally with Digger we finally get to see this side of Tom Cruise come out again. While it may not be the best performance of his career, Tom Cruise is still easily the highlight of this movie. He’s fully committed to the role, making Digger Rockwell this larger than life figure, full of swagger and braggadocio. And what is especially great about the performance is that Cruise manages to disappear in the role. You stop seeing the movie star and begin to see the character, and it’s great to see Tom Cruise finally pull off something like that again in a movie. That one-shot I mentioned earlier is definitely the point where you see Cruise in his element, taking full command of the screen with the power of his delivery and the way he physically throws himself into the moment as well. In addition, the movie also has plenty of memorable performances from a solid supporting cast. Chief among those are Riz Ahmed as Dr. Ganesh and John Goodman as the President. Goodman himself is going just as big and over-the-top as Cruise is in the movie, a mode that we’ve seen him do before brilliantly in a handful of Coen Brothers movies. Riz Ahmed acts as more of the straight man here, and certainly acts as the moral backbone of the story, being the only voice of reason amid all the insanity. Ahmed plays that mode perfectly, while still feeling like his character belongs in this absurdist take on the world. The only actor I feel gets short-changed in the cast is Sandra Huller, whose character unfortunately gets treated like an afterthought through the course of the movie. Coming off her success in Oscar winning movies like Anatomy of a Fall (2023) and The Zone of Interest (2023), as well as this year’s box office hit Project Hail Mary (2026), I wish she was given more to do in this movie.
One other thing that I believe many people will celebrate about this movie is the way it looks. The film was shot by three time Oscar winner Emmanuel Lubezki, who of course won two of his Oscars for Iñárritu movies; Birdman and The Revenant. The duo team up again here and Lubezki does not disappoint. He casts the film with this very muted color palette, which fits within the theme of the movie, which is all about the world decaying under climate catastrophes. One other thing that’s noteworthy about this film is that it’s another recent movie shot on Vistavision, marking another example of the format’s incredible return to prominence in the filmmaking process. While the movie isn’t showing off the format with big sweeping shots like we saw with The Brutalist (2024) or One Battle After Another (2025), it nevertheless does a great job of creating this wide angle effect on all of the interior scenes in the movie, which also again draw attention to the artificiality behind the story being told. It’s Lubezki’s first time working with Vistavision, and hopefully it’s a format his continues to stick with, because it works well with his way of framing his shots. The production design is also beautifully crafted. I liken the look of this film to being a more grim version of the Wes Anderson style. A lot of the film stages itself within these Anderson-like tableaus, and a lot of the fun of watching this movie is in catching all the detail put into the film’s design. This movie also marks a departure for Iñárritu, who is a filmmaker much more drawn to moving his camera around. Here he keeps things mostly stationary, with his camera movements limited to simple pans or dolly shots. There of course is a reason for every scene to have a more locked down movement of the camera, which I don’t want to spoil. But it is a very clear sign of Iñárritu giving himself more challenges to overcome as a filmmaker, which is a positive for this movie. One experimental thing that I don’t think works as well in this movie is the musical score. Written by Cosmo Sheldrake, the music in this movie is aggressively experimental, and oftentimes difficult to listen to. Perhaps that was the aim of the movie, to create a soundscape that was as off kilter as possible, but I felt that it was a bit too distracting and did not benefit the movie as a whole. Otherwise, the craft behind this movie is definitely one of it’s saving graces.
The conversation surrounding this movie is likely to be pretty animated. I tried to keep my opinion on this movie nuanced, because while I didn’t like the experience as a whole, there are still things about it that I do admire. The highlight for sure is Tom Cruise. My worry is that the mixed reception for this movie is going to deter Cruise from ever breaking out of his comfort zone ever again, leaving him to retreat back to his action movies. I really want people to encourage him to take more bold risks as an actor, because we know he can do it and it’s something that he regretfully has been shying away from for too many years. I hope many other filmmakers see Tom Cruise throwing himself so fully into character here and that it convinces them to take a chance on having him in their experimental movies as well. It would be nice if Cruise takes a chance and lends his talents to an A24 or Neon film eventually. Maybe we’ll see him work with the likes of Paul Thomas Anderson again, as the last time they collaborated it resulted in one of Cruise’s greatest performances ever with Magnolia (1999). As of right now, Digger isn’t going to be the movie that opens up a new wave of dramatic roles for Tom Cruise. The movie is too much of a mess to stand out as an awards worthy production. The audience is sure to be very divided on this movie. I can easily understand all of the hate that will be coming this movie’s way, but I can also understand if someone views this movie as a masterpiece. Either way, no one’s opinion is going to be wrong about this movie, and that’s what the most experimental kinds of films do. If you loathe this film and it aggressively turned you off, then that’s a very understandable conclusion. If you loved every second of the movie’s bold, big swings, that I’m happy for you too. That in a way is a triumph for this film, in that it’s going to strike up a lot of discussion. For that alone, I do recommend seeing the movie, just so you can see which side of the spectrum of opinion you fall on. If the movie fails at anything the most, it’s with coming up with a profound statement about the issue of climate change, which I feel got too buried in the weirdness of the film. The movie will stand out more for what it attempted to do rather than what it was trying to say. It was a bold try, and oftentimes it delivers some brilliant moments, but ultimately Digger is let down by it’s own crushing weight of trying to be too many things all at once. But it is better to have tried than to not have tried at all, and for some that may be a diamond in the rough of this very messy and challenging movie.
Rating: 6.5/10