Hollywood analysts say Tom Cruise's satirical black comedy 'Digger,' directed by Alejandro G Iñárritu, is expected to lose around $245 million (£185m), according to BBC reporting.

The film stars Cruise as oil magnate Digger Rockwell, and ticket sales dropped by roughly 60% in its second weekend in cinemas, bringing global takings to around $35 million.

With an estimated $280 million spent on production and marketing, BBC reports the film could become one of the biggest flops in Hollywood history.

The performance stands in sharp contrast to the success of Cruise's recent franchise entries like new instalments of Top Gun and Mission: Impossible, as BBC notes.

'Digger' was Iñárritu's latest after acclaimed films such as Birdman, Babel and The Revenant, yet critics gave it generally poor reviews, prompting Warner Bros to launch a new marketing campaign urging audiences to "decide for yourself."

For film fans, the shock is seeing an auteur-driven satire with the world's biggest movie star crater this fast.

TheWrap's exclusive analysis puts estimates on the bomb's loss as high as $250 million, slightly above the BBC's $245 million figure, so both figures should be read as attributed estimates rather than settled fact.

BBC also reports a break-even dispute: Variety said the film would need around $350 million to break even, while a Warner Bros spokesman told Variety the point was $300 million.

TheWrap's read also places 'Digger' as a 'punishing satire' about climate change that audiences rejected alongside 'The Social Reckoning.'

BBC reports that 'Digger's loss would put it in the same bracket as other films that lost upwards of $100 million, including 1995's Cutthroat Island, 2002's The Adventures of Pluto Nash, 2005's Sahara and 2012's John Carter.

Other nine-figure losses cited by BBC include Mars Needs Moms (2011), Amsterdam (2022), The 13th Warrior (1999), The Marvels (2023) and Speed Racer (2008).

Cruise, for his part, told reporters he never thought of opening weekends while making films, focusing instead on movies that "hopefully will translate, last and evolve."

Variety expects 'Digger' to end its run with around $50 million worldwide, per BBC's reporting, meaning the awards-season campaign spending BBC describes may not rescue it.

TheWrap notes the broader pattern: analyst Paul Dergarabedian told TheWrap that "the cinematic equivalent of fast food is outperforming the cinematic equivalent of fine dining," with horror like Other Mommy and Resident Evil winning the weekend.

TheWrap also points to upcoming tech-issue titles — A24's Elizabeth Holmes documentary "You Can See Everything" and Luca Guadagnino's Sam Altman-focused "Artificial" — as tests of whether audiences will accept serious films at all.