They finally did it. They made a movie that seemingly impossible to review without spoiling it. But we are still going to do it. The last time Tom Cruise starred in an original movie was way back in 2017. Forget all about the franchise installment like Mission Impossible or Top Gun: Maverick.
Actually, Grossman’s probably the closest possible comparison to his latest role, as oil baron Digger Rockwell, in Alejandro González Iñarritu’s “Digger.” Once again. The film is designed to interrogate and exacerbate. It starts as almost an endurance test in witnessing the gluttony of power that has come to shape the fate of the world.
Digger is a braze and absurdly rich oil tycoon. But due to his negligence, a huge iceberg has broken off. This is not only going to kill a lot of people, but it threatens Europe and the world as we know it.
Once again, it’s a role that relies on makeup to make the movie star grotesque, and asks Cruise to put his prodigious talents to use in satirizing a truly evil man with a big swinging personality.
It is because of his proximity to the United States government that he meets with the climate scientist Dr. Ganesh (played by Riz Ahmed) before consulting with President Compson (a role played by John Goodmna). The President believes that nuking the incoming ice chunk is the best option.
Opinions are swayed by the timid Vice President and Digger’s half-sister Emma. Both seem to have a more evenhanded solution. Digger’s mounting realization is that there is no way to spin this story. In fact, the only action he takes must be made with public conviction and personal clarity.
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Tom Cruise more than really anyone else in the movie has a lot to do here. The story is about the stakes of the world and the small group controlling it. It offers explanations about the feelings of an unseen audience whose experiences could never be understood by those who shape it.
Some might argue that the story is specifically moulded for Cruise, who has moved past his nostalgia run with Top Gun and Mission: Impossible to give us a performance wilder than Tropic Thunder’s Les Grossman and more personally revealing than Magnolia’s Frank TJ Mackey.
Digger to some extent might end up resembling the historic box office bomb Heaven’s Gate. The film famously caused the end of the director-driven era of New Hollywood. The only difference is that this new movie wouldn’t have changed the infrastructure of Hollywood if it had been more commercially successful.
Let’s say people are going to love or hate this movie based on where they land politically. It is dealing with climate change, and negligent oil tycoon working with the president. The film in its execution does a good job at transcending that obvious socio-political divide.
It might take some time for Digger’s importance to set in, but its bravura achievements will stand the test of time.
