We all know Anne Hathaway ("The Odyssey," 2026) has had a busy year starring in five films released in theaters since April. Her final 2026 film is Verity, a sensual twisty mystery that’s one half a platform for Dakota Johnson’s ("Madame Web," 2024) blase face and one half a Lifetime original movie. If you want to see a failed flaccid attempt at repeating the excitement of the 2014 thriller "Gone Girl," this is the one for you. In the new release "Verity," Dakota Johnson actually says the line, “Do I not look like I’m having fun?” Girl, the irony of you saying that is mind-blowing.
A much juicier and more complex option in movie theaters is the dark satire, "Digger." Tom Cruise ("Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning," 2025) plays a rich oil baron and land owner who loudly interrupts everyone and bullies his staff to do whatever he wants. When he learns one of his oil extraction sights has exploded on the coast of Greenland, he has to meet with government leaders to try preventing a giant environmental catastrophe. With lots of men shouting, an angry courtroom audience, and a clanging shovel, "Digger" is a tragic melodramatic parody of our planet’s current climate trouble.
Now I know many film critics and movie lovers are trashing this film. Many people are using the words “annoying,” “flop,” and “overblown.” But I did not walk away from this feeling any frustration or disappointment. "Digger" is absolutely a hefty boiling pot of big ideas, big performances, and big settings. Perhaps because everything is so big in this picture, there isn’t enough space or care for all of it to blend together successfully. But also because everything is so big, "Digger" is not boring or lifeless. The time I spent in the theater whooshed by during this viewing. (The film runs at two hours nine minutes.)
Tom Cruise does something notable here he hasn’t done in a long time (specifically since his performance in the 2008 farce, "Tropic Thunder"). He plays a character role. An ugly, wacky, unhinged, unlikable capitalist who ignores scientific warnings and causes imaginable death to satisfy his greed. Tom Cruise might be swinging for his fourth Oscar nomination as an actor here, and he swings hard. All the prosthetics and makeup he wears help him look less like the prosaic action hero and more like a gluttonous histrionic clown.
"Digger" has some interesting surprises meant to add more conceptual layers to the societal consequences of exploiting natural resources. It is visually very rich but thematically one note. That note being, “The destruction of our natural world is simply the cost of doing business. And those responsible for such great destruction won’t be punished that badly.” "Digger" is partly like the earnest chaos of "Don't Look Up" (2021) and partly an overzealous attempt to repeat the awkward humor of "Dr. Strangelove" (1964).
Such an ambitious film works awfully hard to be boldly serious, but it also pushes too hard to be irreverently funny. None of the broadly comedic moments land well, but I understand why the director chose such a confrontational noisy style. Real-life messages about the climate crisis NEED to be confrontational to get everyone’s attention. "Digger’s" vibe of in-your-face masculine hubris is strange (and a lot to take in), but it's also relatable to figures we see in the news today.
I’m happy to say I didn’t hate this film. It was okay. Not the best of this year but also not the worst, and I hope lots of movie lovers will still give this one a chance in the movie theater. Such a lumbering beast of a film will at least get people talking, sharing ideas, and debating its problems.
