What could have been redemption remains a disappointment
⭐1/2 Rating: 1.5 out of 4
The latest from revered filmmaker Alejandro G. Iñárritu is a shocking disappointment, a meandering muddle more akin to his last effort, “Bardo” (2022). than his Oscar-caliber dramas like “Birdman” (2014) or “The Revenant” (2016). For the first hour we are subjected to one of the most bombastic, self-indulgent projects by a master helmsman since Francis Ford Coppola’s urban architecture mishegas, “Megalopolis” (2024).
The backdrop of “Digger” involves a “Cats”-like cultural phenomena called “Fossil Fools” — I’ll say no more to avoid spoilers. Tom Cruise, as the paunchy, cantankerous oil tycoon Digger Rockwell, is tight enough with the POTUS (John Goodman) that he can get the leader of the free world and his military advisors to come meet with him at his ancestral estate (badly in need of roof repairs).
There’s a lot of white people with money in “Digger,” which hints at having something to say about inherited wealth, white power structures and Christian values (for an example of a movie that addresses these issues well, see “One Battle After Another”). Those are just mirages, an exhausting exercise for the audience, which is forced to endure all-for-naught zaniness such as a 30-year-old cat with diarrhea using Digger’s sprawling bed as a litter box. It’s like Iñárritu morphed into Wes Anderson on a bad acid-trip.
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