Digger (Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, 2026)

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(WARNING: plot twists and story discussed in explicit detail!)

Digger for Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu is arguably his most expensive production yet ($125 million officially); for Hollywood superstar Tom Cruise it's September. 

The film has been described as 'obnoxious,' 'self-indulgent,' 'pretentious,' and-- possibly most hurtful-- 'delusional;' it's also been called 'brave.'

I like 'indulgent.' Cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki has lit and shot the film to look like the world's most elaborate stage production, complete with sets gargantuan enough to make Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark look like a modest high school musical, and miniatures with enough sprawl and detail to delight the most avaricious railroad collector (the spots that illuminate the knee-high trees and waist-high grassy hills have all the drama of a museum exhibit, the delicacy of a children's book illustration (pop-up of course); the showstopping ten-minute monologue that climaxes the middle of the film with its Greek chorus of European leaders baying for Digger's blood seethes with bloodlust, held back only by fear of the ceaselessly watching news cameras-- you get the sense that they hate the man not just for what he's done but for the freedom he represents as opposed to the restraint that they, being supposedly civilized, must show). 

I'd call that climactic monologue both the film's highlight and its downfall. O I can see what Inarritu with Cruise as his braying mouthpiece was going for-- that Richard lll moment where the Duke of Gloster woos Lady Anne when she has every reason in the world to hate him, only instead of a beautiful widow he's facing a roomful of old men, and I see several problems with this scenario: 1) with Anne, Richard can use his sexual charisma despite (or because of) his deformity, and Anne's own grief against her (grief being perversely a potent aphrodisiac); 2) he's enjoying a one-on-one conversation with Anne, not trying to address a roomful of Andies at once; 3) he's been played by Laurence Olivier onscreen and Cruise, energetic and loud that he is, is no Olivier; and 4) Inarritu has worked on the monologue with a team of writers including himself, none of which are Shakespeare. 

So that climactic monologue though well done-- or as well done as anything short of resurrecting both Olivier and Shakespeare can possibly accomplish-- doesn't work. The European leaders are at most distracted and at best confused, not converted; more to the point we're confused, and definitely don't feel converted. Both Digger and his president Compson (a hilariously decaying John Goodman) keep trying to 'control the narrative' when frankly there's no narrative to control; they have only so much time and so much resources to do what needs to be done and they waste time on trying to win over public opinion. Even more puzzling is the sense you're getting that Inarritu and Cruise are trying to win over our opinion by introducing a meta element, a narrative framework that forces us to step back and contemplate the larger implications: what is Digger here, a buffoon making us laugh or a psychopath preparing our doom? What is this telling supposed to accomplish, so many years after the fact? And-- I suspect-- Inarritu along the way is trying to sneak in justification for his stylized lighting and extravagant miniatures when really they don't need excusing, they're just a pleasure to look at onscreen. 

Which goes to that other film Digger seems to want to emulate, Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove-- the sobering fact of which is that almost everyone (except for Sterling Hayden's Jack D. Ripper) comes off as so intelligent and reasonable within their human limits and they still they can't save the world. Right off they know controlling the narrative's a waste of time-- the bombers were already flying at failsafe point when they were ordered to execute Plan R; almost from the very start it's too late to stop. Digger and his superiors-- and the actor playing Digger and his producer-- don't seem to realize at what point of the narrative they're really on, and just drone on and on and on, on the finer points of meaning. 

Kubrick with Peter Sellers as his barely-under-control constantly improvising mouthpiece saves the blather for after the end. He outlines a plan for survival for a select few of the rich and powerful, at the bottom of mine shafts, and his plan (as with almost everything else in Strangelove) seems so intelligently crafted and sanely presented it almost feels like a viable alternative-- you literally have to shake your head and yell at the screen: "President of a Mine Shaft? Is that all you're left with?" But the Doctor just drones on and on and on, the difference being it's the end of the film not the middle, and you literally have nothing left to do but wipe away a tear at the lilting voice of Vera Lynn, admire all the bursting bombs, leave when the lights go up (and yes I stayed for Digger's end credits, complete with final joke more clever than funny). 

O I like the picture enough-- up to that monologue it's an excellent hour-and-change feature; the rest with all the metaphysical fiddling about feels more optional, something you can sit through if you like or stop to exit, go to search bar, type KUBRICK. And so it goes.