Tom Cruise's Digger hits low 53% Rotten Tomatoes score, embraces bad reviews in bold new ad

With a 53% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, Digger has become Tom Cruise's worst-reviewed film since 2017's The Mummy, and the lowest-rated movie of Alejandro González Iñárritu's career. Its Metacritic score is even lower, at 44 out of 100. The marketing team isn't hiding any of that. Its newest spot puts the divided reception front and center.

Rather than stringing together only glowing blurbs, the ad sets raves and pans side by side. It opens with a line from X user @thejonathansim, who calls Digger "an ambitious film sure to polarize audiences." Cruise's Digger Rockwell then answers the naysayers directly, shrugging it off, with a few profanities, granted.

From there, the trailer cuts back and forth between opposing verdicts. "Unpleasant" gives way to "masterpiece," "baffling" to "brilliant," and "insufferable" to "magnificent." It's a cheeky way to turn a middling critical consensus into a talking point: if people can't agree on the film, the ad suggests, you'd better see it and decide for yourself.

The final review quoted, from Instagram user @taraontv, pushes that idea further: "I have never wanted to say less about a movie in my life. Go in blind! I mean it." Cruise's oil baron gets the last word with a fittingly slippery line: "They're afraid to tell the truth — whatever that is."

The satire stars Cruise as a narcissistic oil tycoon whose company sets off a catastrophic environmental disaster. It's a character who seems to thrive on controversy, and the studio appears to be betting that audiences will too.

The ad reflects a critical response that has split cleanly in two, with little middle ground. Early reactions ranged from praise for one of the most daring studio films in years to outright dismissal. Variety's Clayton Davis predicted early on that the divide would be wide.

On the enthusiastic side, IndieWire's Jim Hemphill called it Cruise's best role since Magnolia and one of the most visually inventive, unpredictable studio pictures ever made. His colleague Anne Thompson described it as "a brave and gorgeous art film," though she doubted it would win over mainstream audiences and expected it to play best with Academy voters.

Others admired the ambition more than the execution. Next Best Picture's Matt Neglia praised Cruise's performance as his most dynamic in years but felt the film's zany spectacle kept him from going deeper. Davis also applauded Cruise, John Goodman, and the film's craft, but argued the pieces never quite come together. Harsher reviews came from Awards Radar's Joey Magidson, who called the film "a mess," and critic Edward Douglas, who predicted opening-night audiences would give it a dismal CinemaScore.

Even skeptics tend to single out Cruise, who performs under heavy prosthetics, and co-star Riz Ahmed as highlights. The visuals have drawn little dispute either, with Iñárritu reuniting with cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki and production designer Dennis Gassner. The four-time Oscar nominee, who received an Honorary Oscar last year but has never won a competitive Academy Award, could still see the role figure into this season's awards race.

The cast also includes Sandra Hüller, Goodman, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Jesse Plemons. Iñárritu co-wrote the script with his Birdman collaborators Alexander Dinelaris and Nicolás Giacobone, along with Sabina Berman.