Warner Bros. Turns 'Digger' Bad Buzz Into Its Own Marketing

Warner Bros. has launched a new ad for Tom Cruise's "Digger" that quotes both rave and scathing reactions side by side and tells moviegoers to "decide for yourself."

The trailer still pairs "Masterpiece" with "Unpleasant." It toggles between "Brilliant" and "Baffling," and between "Magnificent" and "Insufferable." The quoted phrases come from film influencers who screened the movie early and posted their reactions after the social embargo lifted on Sept. 22.

"Same film, different truth," the ad reads.

"Digger" stars Cruise as an oil tycoon whose drilling triggers a climate crisis. The film's director, Alejandro G. Iñárritu, marks a milestone for the star: it is Cruise's first non-action hero role in nearly a decade.

Warner Bros. posted the ad one hour before the review embargo lifted — the moment critics were allowed to publish their verdicts. The timing suggests a deliberate attempt to get ahead of reviewers, who proved far less generous than the first wave of social media pundits.

Variety's chief film critic Owen Gleiberman called the film "so full of itself" in his review. "The movie cost north of $125 million to make, and that figure is not only too big to probably justify itself; it's a testament to the arrogance of the filmmakers — to the assumption that we'll turn out in droves for this ponderous absurdist lecture," Gleiberman wrote.

Bilge Ebiri of Vulture was no kinder. "'Digger' is a torturous experience, sometimes purposefully so, often unintentionally so," he wrote in his review.

David Ehrlich of IndieWire dubbed the film a "surreal misfire" and graded it a C+. "Digger" currently holds a 52% score among critics on Rotten Tomatoes.

The studio's gamble reframes a divided critical reception as a selling point rather than a liability. Whether audiences take up the invitation to "decide for themselves" will become clear when "Digger" opens in theaters on Oct. 2.