Digger (2026) | Film Review

Tom Cruise stars as Digger Rockwell, an oil tycoon with little respect for anyone aside from his beloved cat, whom he refuses to allow to die. When a methane explosion triggers an ice shift and catastrophe looms, the story kicks into gear. And that’s where I’ll stop. Seriously, the less you know about Digger going in, the better. The marketing has shockingly not given this one away, and there are some genuinely bonkers twists along the way that make Tom Cruise in a bald cap massaging a kitty corpse seem almost normal.

Almost.

Alejandro G. Iñárritu directs with precision and purpose, and it’s clear he has more on his mind than climate change. Digger is a dissection of the modern human condition, examining our inability to get out of our own way and society’s laughable attempts to shame selfishness out of existence. We create our own problems, congratulate ourselves for recognizing them, and then keep doing exactly what got us here. Cynical indictment or cautionary tale? You decide.

Either way, the filmmaking is undeniably impressive. The visuals are gorgeous, Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s direction is deliberate, and the entire production radiates ambition. Iñárritu knows exactly how he wants this world to look and feel. The problem is that he doesn’t always seem to know where he wants the story to go.

And boy, does it wander.

I cannot get specific without spoiling some of the film’s wildest turns, but Digger desperately wants to be a defining movie for our time. It wants to say something profound about power, humanity, and the absurdity of modern life. Sometimes it succeeds. Other times, it feels like a hiker lost in the wilderness, confidently marching in the wrong direction.

Coen Brothers meets Woody Allen via Terry Gilliam is the best way to describe the experience. Dark comedy, absurdist satire, surreal detours, and existential musings collide, but no single tone holds the line. Just when you think you’ve figured out what kind of movie you’re watching, it changes course.

Ambition is great, having something to say is even better. But a movie still needs to find a way to say it without getting lost in its own ideas. Digger never quite manages that consistency, and its narrative instability keeps it from becoming the masterpiece it so clearly wants to be.

What does work exceptionally well, though, is Tom Freaking Cruise.

For an actor whose career has become synonymous with death-defying stunts and blockbuster spectacle the past decade or two, Cruise reminds us of what happens when he gets the chance to truly disappear into a character. Digger Rockwell is far more layered than the trailers suggest, and Cruise commits to every bizarre, uncomfortable, and outrageous aspect of the role.

He’s not simply playing a cartoonishly wealthy eccentric. Digger is fully fleshed out, nuanced, and complicated, with contradictions that make him fascinating even when the movie around him starts coming apart at the seams. Cruise never waivers from the goal, never winks at the audience or seems embarrassed by the material. He simply commits, and that commitment elevates nearly every scene he’s in.

Not to be hyperbolic, but this may be Tom Cruise’s best acting performance to date.

When a film swings this big, it deserves some credit for trying, even if it only halfway delivers. I’d rather watch a filmmaker take an enormous creative risk than another carefully manufactured movie that plays it safe and leaves no impression whatsoever.

Digger is neither a masterpiece nor garbage. It’s a fascinating, frustrating, visually stunning mess with big ideas, wild swings, and a story that can’t quite get out of its own way. Your mileage will vary, and I suspect this is one of those films that will inspire wildly different reactions depending on what you want from a movie.

For me, the ambition is admirable, the filmmaking is impressive, and the storytelling is all over the place. But Tom Cruise? Absolutely delivers. At the very least, Digger reminds us that Cruise is much more than an action hero. He’s also a damn good actor, willing to take risks and get weird when the right role comes along.

And sometimes, watching a movie swing for the fences and miss is more interesting than watching one that never bothers to even step up to the plate.