DIGGER. The truth is that I didn’t think I would enjoy Digger. Even more than that, I had assumed that it would disappoint me: a stickler for the psychological battery that characterizes the realist landscapes of Alejandro González Iñárritu’s pre-2010s catalogue. I saw the trailers and was quick to write the movie off as another auteur turned sellout when given a big budget. Even his multi-award-winning Revenant (2015), with its stunning photographic direction and nuanced portrayal of life in the colonial “frontier” struck me upon first watch as an alienating stylistic departure into mainstream aesthetics. (This despite massive commercial success and my own enjoyment of the film.) Am I the problem? Watching Digger has confirmed that, indeed, I am the problem and Iñárritu always wins.
Firstly, it must be said that this movie, and ones besmirched before it, contain superior technical execution. The cinematography alone of this film — with long takes of impassioned monologues, calculated low angles of farcical villains, sickly pale lighting and dynamic tracking shots of chaos — is enough to make a cinephile foam at the mouth. Opulent set designs (within set designs) of verdant, bureaucratic and apocalyptic landscapes are posed to highlight the surreal and interrogate sustainability. The score designed by Cosmo Sheldrake — son of the eccentric parapsychologist Rupert Sheldrake, known for his theory of morphic resonance — seems to invoke his father’s concept for the way it embodies the film’s existential reckoning with the interconnected decisions of the most empowered that pull everyone into the worst outcomes of the climate crisis.
Tom Cruise works double time as the film’s lead in a performance unlike anything I’ve encountered from this actor. Whether typecast or simply lacking range, Cruise rarely delivers a performance distinguishable from his other characters: Cruise playing Cruise. However, Digger shows a side of Cruise only comparable to his performance as the character Les Grossman in Tropic Thunder (2008); when lost in the opacity of a costume and given the tools of comedy, Cruise disappears into a role that is humorous and uncomfortably lifelike. As both a convincing caricature and a revelation of a gerontocratic belief system, Cruise’s role goes beyond cheap laughs.
All of the above could not be actualized without Iñárritu’s vision. Without doubt, this director demonstrates command over every element of the filmmaking craft. Particularly his writing (and that of the three other credited screenwriters Sabina Berman, Alexander Dinelaris Jr. and Nicolás Giacobone) is what distinctly impressed me. Though Digger appeared to be one thing in its theatrical trailer — a kind of rehashing of the central themes of Dr. Strangelove with a climate-focused spin — it ventured far beyond where I thought it would go. Admittedly, I felt that the first half was ham-fisted in its messaging, enough so that I jotted in my notes that a certain monologue before the European Parliament in the movie’s second act recalled the feminist generalizations of America Ferrera’s monologue in Barbie (2023). This is to say that at first glance, its satire was too blatant to contain depth. However, by the time I reached the triple whammy of monologues delivered in succession by Cruise, Sophie Wilde and Jesse Plemons, I felt sure I was watching something distinct and calculated if the viewer allowed themselves to map the less obvious parts of the film’s world over their own. This was only heightened by the eerie familiarity of the film’s uncanny final shot which left me and my friends silent as we left the theater.
There comes a time when every cinephile must eat crow, and this is my moment. Digger encapsulates (some of) Iñárritu’s best filmmaking qualities. It tells a story warped across time and generations about worlds not so unfamiliar from our own. It offers dense visual and auditory landscapes that assume a nearly anthropomorphic quality alongside the writing. The same could be said of his Babel, my favorite film of all time. If there is one thing I know about this filmmaker, he hopes his audience leaves devastated. Whether you leave riveted by the horror of gluttonous apathy and climate consequences or simply disappointed, Digger is sure to devastate. R. 128M. BROADWAY, MINOR .
Sasha Senal (she/they) is a writer, environmental educator and aspiring farmer. She can be found exploring Humboldt forests (not unlike her home redwoods on the Sonoma Coast) and considering Black eco-feminism.
NOW PLAYING
ANGEL AND THE BADMAN. Western about an outlaw saved by the love of a good woman. PG13. 105M. BROADWAY.
AVENGERS ENDGAME (2019). The Marvel mega-cast assembles with a few minutes of extra footage for the strong of bladder. 181M. PG13. BROADWAY.
COYOTE VS. ACME. Animated and live-action shenanigans as the coyote gets his day in court. PG. 101M. BROADWAY.
FORGOTTEN ISLAND. Animated adventure about besties stranded in a magical world. PG. 109M. BROADWAY.
GONE WITH THE WIND (1939). Four hours of the life and loves of the messiest woman ever to enslave people and make a dress from draperies. G. 238M. BROADWAY.
HEART OF THE BEAST. Brad Pitt fights for survival in the Alaskan wilderness with only his combat dog because Lord knows his kids aren’t talking to him. PG13. 101M. BROADWAY.
OTHER MOMMY. Jessica Chastain gives us all issues as a creepy doppelganger emerging from a girl’s closet and making ball pits even scarier. R. 93M. BROADWAY.
PAN’S LABYRINTH (2006). Re-upping the dark Guillermo del Toro coming-of-age fantasy to remind you he can make you sad and terrified at the same time. R. 118M. BROADWAY, MINOR.
PRACTICAL MAGIC 2. Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman return as witchy sisters trying to break the family curse but like, could they also, you know? PG13. 110M. BROADWAY (3D), MINOR.
PRIMETIME. Drama about the To Catch a Predator guy (Robert Pattinson), who seems to have missed a few in and around the White House. R. 110M. BROADWAY, MINOR.
RESIDENT EVIL. Director Zach Cregger takes a shot at the zombie action franchise with a medical courier (Austin Abrams) headed for Raccoon City. R. 93M. BROADWAY, MINOR.
THE SOCIAL RECKONING. Drama based on the Facebook whistleblower who revealed the company’s dirty secrets to the Wall Street Journal. R. 112M. BROADWAY.
VERITY. A writer (Dakota Jackson) takes a job ghostwriting the end of a book after an accident leaves its bestselling author (Anne Hathaway) comatose. R. 114M. BROADWAY.
For showtimes, visit catheaters.com and minortheatre.com.
This article appears in Gold in the Cracks.
