Remember when Tom Cruise “saved” Hollywood with “Top Gun Maverick”?
When movie theater attendance was greatly lessened by the pandemic and apathy, Cruise was credited with bringing audiences back.
Then his “Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning” was also a massive box office hit.
But audiences are fickle. They knew Cruise from those franchises. Original, quirky films are not Cruise’s strong suit.
Such may be the case with Oscar winner Alejandro Innaritu’s “Digger,” set for release October 2nd from Warner Bros. John Goodman is the main co-star.
“Digger” is not Tom Cruise jumping off buildings or cliffs. Instead, it’s him in what looks like a broad comedy, wearing heavy prosthetics.
The trailer, frankly, resembles a lesser Coen brothers movie, like “The Hudsucker Proxy.” And that’s a problem.
So far, Warner’s has only promoted the movie to “influencers,” hoping that by plying them with food, light interviews, and personal photos with Cruise would send interest in the film zooming.
But a check of YouTube shows disappointing results.Even though the studio had a special vanity event to debut the film’s official Warner’s trailer, results have been wanting. YouTube shows only 4.5 million views for “Digger” in the US. (Australia has 1 million views, if that helps.)
A Tom Cruise retrospective trailer for “Digger” that relies heavily on clips from his older, more famous movies actually exceeds the regular version at 4.7 million views.
By comparison, trailers for other September and October movies show a lot more interest from potential ticket buyers. Jessica Chastain’s “Other Mommy,” Jon Cena’s “Matchbox the Movie,” and Brad Pitt’s “Heart of the Beast” each have two to five times the views of “Digger.”
Warner’s 2025 was a banner year, with “One Battle After Another” winning the Oscar and the box office, and a parade of other hits including “Sinners” (Best Actor Michael B. Jordan) and “Weapons” (Amy Madigan, Best Supporting Actress). This year is clearly one for rebuilding toward 2027 — and “Digger” may be collateral damage along the way.
And let’s not forget: Warner’s will come in very strong later this fall with “Dune 3,” sure to be a blockbuster and multiple awards nominee.
The big question is why Warner’s entertained TikTok celebrities to promote this film (which is explored in today’s Page Six). Innaritu has two of his Oscars for directing, plus a huge following among serious critics for films like “Birdman,” “The Revenant,” and “Amores Perros.”
PS “Digger” isn’t the only movie star driven film with a lack of trailer excitement. Even worse is Ryan Reynolds aka Deadpool in “Mayday” with Kenneth Branagh. That trailer only has 638K views for its Apple release.
