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Tom Cruise Dismisses Opening Weekend as 'Digger' Bombs
By @sharedot · · 6 pages
- Film
- Box Office
- Tom Cruise
- Digger
Tom Cruise says he doesn't make movies for opening weekend after Iñárritu's 'Digger' opened to just $8 million domestic, his biggest flop yet.
The Flop That Redefined Cruise's Career
Alejandro G. Iñárritu's satirical comedy-drama Digger delivered one of the weakest opening weekends of Tom Cruise's career, grossing just $8 million in North America and around $20 million worldwide. Epicstream reports the film made it his biggest bomb to date, with the studio expected to lose around $150 million. metro.co.uk adds that the film reportedly cost more than $160 million to make, with a further $100 million on marketing, and Variety's estimates — cited by Metro — suggest losses could reach between $150 million and $200 million theatrically, with a roughly $350 million global gross needed to break even. For a star whose *Top Gun: Maverick* earned almost $1.5 billion in 2022, the reversal is stark.
Cruise's Case for the Long View
Speaking on the On Film With Kevin McCarthy podcast — an interview released on Digger's opening day — Cruise was unbowed. "When I am making [movies], I'm not going, 'Opening weekend!' I feel very much like we're going to make something that is a lasting piece of cinema," he said. He and Iñárritu pointed to *Blade Runner* as a "masterpiece" that "everybody killed" at release, hoping their work can similarly "transcend" its reception. Cruise, 64, also recalled an era when films like *Rain Man* and *Born on the Fourth of July* would "just play and play for a year" in theaters, and insisted he feels that way about *Digger*. The remarks went viral after the weekend's reports confirmed the film's abysmal debut.
What 'Digger' Is — and Why It Divides
Per Epicstream, *Digger* follows "the most powerful man in the world" on a frantic mission to prove he is humanity's savior before the disaster he has unleashed destroys everything. Cruise leads a cast that includes Riz Ahmed, John Goodman, Sandra Hüller, Michael Stuhlbarg and Jesse Plemons, with Iñárritu directing from a screenplay co-written with Alexander Dinelaris, Nicolás Giacobone and Sabina Berman, and a story by Berman, Iñárritu and Jez Butterworth. The film was shot on VistaVision cameras, giving it a distinctive visual style. Metro reports the satire has sharply divided critics — some declared it a masterpiece, others were far less enthusiastic — and that Cruise calls making it an "honor."
The Stakes for a Legacy Star
The question now, as Epicstream frames it, is whether Cruise will return to action movies after this performance. Cruise has remained publicly proud, thanking the cast and crew for their "dedication, hard work and joy" on social media and saying the experience was "truly unforgettable." Whether *Digger* earns the *Blade Runner*-style reassessment Cruise hopes for remains to be seen, but the climb from a $20 million worldwide opening to roughly $350 million would be steep.