Tom Cruise’s ‘Digger’ Struggles at Box Office with $20 Million Debut
The film drew a $20 million global opening and is projected to leave Warner Bros. with a loss of more than $150 million, analysts said.
- Warner Bros.' Digger opened to $20 million globally this weekend, marking Tom Cruise's worst box office debut in 19 years. The domestic opening of $8 million ranks among the lowest for a Cruise film in wide release.
- Marketing efforts alternated between hiding Cruise's face and emphasizing his brand, leaving audiences confused. Cruise pivoted from 15 years of signature death-defying stunts to a two-and-a-half-hour climate satire where he inhabits an exaggerated character.
- Digger's domestic performance ranks among the top 20 lowest for films in at least 3,300 locations. Critics gave mixed-to-negative reviews, while PostTrak and CinemaScore data showed audiences gave a C+ rating with only 47% definite recommend.
- Skydance will inherit the likely $150 million-plus loss alongside Warner Bros., marking Cruise's career-worst flop. The actor announced a Days of Thunder sequel less than six weeks ago, signaling a pivot back to legacy franchises.
- Industry analysts question whether Cruise's long-term bankability has been damaged, though his Days of Thunder follow-up aims to recapture past success. This failure underscores the difficulty of selling expensive, abstract projects compared to his traditional stunt-heavy action films.
15 Articles
15 Articles
While Paramount signed the Warner acquisition on Tuesday 6 October, the prestigious studio finished its independent career on a box-office failure, the worst score of the entire career of the star of "Mission: Impossible".
The Independent
The Independent (US)Digger is Tom Cruise’s biggest ever flop for one obvious reason
*SPOILER WARNING* Full of unfunny jokes, career-worst performances and a baffling plot twist, Alejandro G Iñárritu’s disastrous climate farce has deservedly faced dire reviews and cripplingly low box office. But it wasn’t helped by its perplexingly aloof and endlessly shifting promotional campaign, writes Adam White
Why in the Hell Did DIGGER End Up Costing as Much as a Marvel Studios Blockbuster?
Someone at Warner Bros. looked at an R-rated black comedy from Alejandro González Iñárritu starring Tom Cruise and decided, “Yeah, let’s spend Marvel money on this thing.”That’s a part of Digger that I can’t get over. The movie crashed into theaters with just around $8 million domestivally from 3,321 locations in North America. Overseas audiences didn’t come running to see it either. Digger pulled in another $12 million internationally for a pai…
Iñarritu's new film is sinking into the film stercolero from which it should never have been released.
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