'Digger': A Man. A Plan. A Meltdown

ALEJANDRO González Iñárritu, the Oscar-winning director of Birdman and The Revenant, teams up with Tom Cruise for this ambitious black comedy satire about an impending global catastrophe.

It is fitting therefore that the reception for this movie in the real world has been similarly catastrophic.

The critical response has, it’s safe to say, been less than laudatory, with many labelling it the biggest misfire of this acclaimed director’s career thus far.

Audiences don’t appear to be particularly enthused either. Produced on a budget of nearly $200 million, it took around $8 million on its opening at the North American box office.

This is a movie that does not require a review so much as an inquest.

Cruise stars as Digger Rockwell, an aging, cat-fancying oil tycoon with a great deal of notoriety. He has recently cut a backroom deal with the ailing US president (John Goodman) to drill for oil in Greenland, despite warnings from scientists to do otherwise.

One day drilling triggers an enormous release of methane gas, triggering a massive explosion. This causes an ice shelf the size of the state of Maryland to break off.

At an emergency meeting, Digger and the president are warned by Dr Nirav Ganesh (Riz Ahmed) that the ice is on a collision course with Western Europe, with the potential to cause a natural disaster that lead to countless casualties.

He warns that there may be only three days to avert this disaster, even if it can be averted.

Digger, an arrogant, bellicose and self-righteous man, comes to realise that he has got the world into a fine old mess and that he is the only one who can dig it out.

With millions of live and trillions of dollars at stake, the fate of the world hangs in the balance.

Iñárritu is a director who usually can do little wrong in my book. His films are a masterclass in storytelling ambition, balancing unconventional ideas and characterisations while keeping things investing and entertaining.

Cruise has been a top box office draw for the past 40 years for a reason, an actor unafraid to risk life and limb (often literally) to keep blockbuster audiences coming back for more.

Donning wrinkly prosthetics and a fat suit and affecting a spittle-flecking Texan drawl, you can’t accuse him of not giving his all in Digger.

Where the film ultimately falls down is in terms of storytelling choices and narrative structure.

The film takes bold choices with its story that simply do not work.

Without getting into spoiler territory, there is a big twist during the film’s first act that upends most everything you expect it to be and that bold choice lands not with a flourish but a thud. Instead of intriguing the audience as intended, it serves only to frustrate, turning what could have been an entertaining satire into an awkward, self-regarding farce that raises very few laughs.

I think I may have chuckled once. The rest of the cinema wasn’t exactly rolling in the aisles either.

As if realising this, Iñárritu seems to have directed his actors to ham it up to the hilt, delivering performances that resemble exercises in scenery-chewing one-upmanship.

As a result, the satirical message of the film is largely drowned out and the pathos it occasionally strives for dies on its feet.

A big, lumbering disappointment, the ambitious reach of Digger exceeds its grasp.

RATING: **