Popcorn Perspectives with Danny Minton
Week of October 5, 2026
Digger
Rated R for pervasive language
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 51%
In Theaters
Just a few weeks ago, Digger was at the top of the Oscar predictions, showing the film to be competitive in all categories including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Tom Cruise) and Best Supporting Actor (John Goodman). But then people saw it, and instead of placing bets on the prediction markets, they found themselves scratching their heads. For the first act, you get exactly what you think you are going to get if you had watched the trailer. Then you get the first indication that this is not going to be a straightforward film. I normally hate spoilers. But if it’s a matter of a little spoiler and you not watching a film at all because of bad reviews, I’d rather clue you in, just a little. And since the movie got destroyed at the box office this week, this will let you know why I think the reviews have been unfair. So here’s the twist. At the second act you discover that the whole story is inside the tech rehearsal for a play. Tom Cruise is just an actor playing Digger. The supporting cast are mostly just extras in a big-budget stage production. For many of the critics reviewing, this is where things went sideways and they just weren’t able to get past the shock. I think many were expecting Citizen Kane or Dr. Strangelove, and then this happened. Personally, I expected a film like that also, but I felt I got it. The film does move through your brain in weird ways that are hard to process in the moment. I believe that it is supposed to linger in your head so it can grow on you, which is precisely what it did for me. When we critics leave a theater, we are usually given a comment card where we are asked to give our immediate opinion. Many times, we sit in the lobby and discuss what we just experienced. For Digger, this might have been a bad thing. Writing down your opinion for the studio immediately upon exiting the theater sometimes locks it in and might not be in the best interest of the marketing department. When I saw it, I was the only person in the theater and there was no one to ask me about it afterward. I left thinking “well that was just odd.” But then I started to digest it and put it together. What started as a neutral or even negative opinion developed into something else entirely. I started to understand what director Alejandro González Iñárritu was trying to tell me, and I loved it. It’s like taking in a complex piece of art in a museum. If you just walk by and glance at it, you won’t appreciate it. But when you sit down and take it in properly, things have the ability to start coming together. I think that this film is a misunderstood masterpiece that may or may not find an audience, depending much on whether or not folks actually give it a chance. A