'Digger' is No Laughing Matter
We’re supposed to be watching a comedy. It’s blatantly stated in the trailers and posters for Digger. Even in the movie, the characters break the 4th wall multiple times to remind the audience they are watching a comedy. Yet Alejandro González Iñárritu aims for a mix of Dr. Strangelove and Birdman, creating a bone-chilling film that’s small potatoes compared to what may lie ahead in our near future. Even if Digger didn’t come at a more opportune time, its swings hit hard, though it misses a few. Most importantly, it’s a movie that’s not a crowd-pleaser. It’s a bleak reminder of where we’re headed unless we rise against the billionaires controlling the world.
Alejandro González Iñárritu follows his themes of ego from Birdman into Digger. Sometimes a little too literally, with its points being bludgeoned over the audience’s head. That’s its intention. It’s meant to go big or go home. The movie's plot is familiar until the rug is pulled out from under the audience, making us question what is real and what is fake. The plot is a disaster film. Due to the methane produced by oil tycoon Digger Rockwell (Tom Cruise). The polar ice caps are separating, creating an iceberg the size of which we’ve never seen before, and it’s headed straight for us. It will wipe out millions. The person who’s assigned to solve the issue is Digger. As you can imagine, Digger doesn’t take the measured, noble route.
Digger ignored scientists' warnings for years about what might happen, choosing to keep harming the environment for his own greedy profit. In the present, Digger continues to scoff at his top scientist, Ganesh (Riz Ahmed), because his solutions aren’t ideal or fast enough. Hopefully, the President of the United States has some common sense and assigns someone else to the matter. Sadly, President Compson is a mentally deteriorating dictator. We all know the euphemism. Everything is going to hell, and there probably won’t be a happy outcome. If the movie has its biggest shortcomings, it’s in Digger himself.
Not all protagonists have to be likable. Some can be despicable oil tycoons like Daniel Plainview. There Will Be Blood, however, gives Plainview a little more nuance and complexity than the buffoon we see in this picture. The film makes small attempts to develop Digger’s character through his half-sister, Emma Rockwell (Sandra Hüller). Most of that character development is overshadowed by the movie’s blatant metaphors that repeat themselves in different variations that’s exhausting and unsettling. Like last week’s Primetime, Digger has a big theme about acting. It’s about how we’re all playing roles when we lie to the world about our true nature, because we lie to ourselves. A democratic system elected the evil men who represent the billionaires that control the world. When the billionaires realize how their mistakes could affect them too, they rush to the media to warn us, despite themselves being warned, acting like they’re being brave. It’s the character they play, pretending like everything is okay when there should be endless global protests. To humanity’s dismay, the people don’t rise because it’s difficult to. Yet necessary for change.
Tom Cruise is playing almost a dual role. He’s obnoxiously over the top. Yet the material demands it. Cruise plays his character with thick makeup and a long Southern drawl. He sounds like Foghorn Leghorn's son. It works for the role for its wittiness and other reasons I can’t give away without spoiling the movie. Tom Cruise is why most folks want to fork out their money, and he delivers. In a picture that breaks the 4th wall more than Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Cruise’s casting choice and over-the-top performance make sense in a narrative that will make you continually say WTF. Cruise’s Oscar clip will undoubtedly be his long speech on the necessity of oil. Cruise might not be a character actor, but he’s amazing at playing narcissists. Cruise knows people’s negative perception of his persona, and he uses it as a self-aware challenge to the audience.
Iñárritu paints a pessimistic picture that makes us wish for hope in its story, as there is still a slim chance of it in ours. Unfortunately for his tale, it’s a tragedy outlined as a comedy. It tackles its material as a bombastic eulogy to a fallen country. It’s an alarm-bell film, but not everyone will embrace it. The picture is almost visually unpleasant, with a smoky lack of color, long lenses fixed on close subjects, and awkward angles that resemble something out of a nightmare. When the curtains are drawn, we’re left with a difficult future our children could inherit. If cinema reflects the world we live in, then the world has become a very dark place in theaters this year. Digger is devilishly entertaining, yet its dreariness is numbing. As a companion piece to Birdman, Digger can’t fly as that movie could. Yet it’s an experience you won’t forget.
