Digger (2026) | REVIEW

Tom Cruise as 'Digger Rockwell' in Alejandro G. Iñárritu's DIGGER -- PHOTO: Warner Bros. Pictures (Still image from trailers).
Tom Cruise as ‘Digger Rockwell’ in Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s DIGGER — PHOTO: Warner Bros. Pictures (Still image from trailers).

Directed by Alejandro G. Iñárritu (The Revenant) — Screenplay by Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Alexander Dinelaris Jr., Nicolás Giacobone, and Sabina Berman.

It feels oddly appropriate that the final Warner Bros. release prior to the studio being acquired by Paramount Skydance is a major swing about world-ending crises and controlling the narrative, and starring one of the biggest movie stars from the last few decades in an unflattering part whilst covered in old-age make-up. Digger, from Birdman director Alejandro González Iñárritu, is a deeply fascinating film that is incredibly difficult to talk about without revealing the nature of the trick hidden up its sleeve. It’s also likely to be one of the most divisive films of the decade, because of how it feels designed to be both provocative and grating, for the purpose of establishing some of its points. It’s also a film best experienced without much foreknowledge of the goings-on in the film, and so I have done my utmost to write about the film and its ideas without spelling out the ‘trick’ and rather referring to it through references and the ideas it brings to the table.

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2023 TV Catch-Up / Backlog: The Mixed Bags | Bite-Sized Reviews

(L-R) The Changeling (Apple TV+); Monarch: Legacy of Monsters (Apple TV+), The Crown (Netflix).

In this edition of Additional Bite-Sized Reviews, the point of this post is to function as a review compilation, if you will, of some notable 2023 television series that I’ve either caught up with in the last few months or which I never found the time to write about when they were released way back when (i.e. my review notes backlog). For this post, I have specifically highlighted three shows from the past year that didn’t fully work for me, even though I liked a fair bit about them.


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REVIEW: Kong: Skull Island (2017)

Release Poster – Warner Bros. Pictures

The following is a review of Kong: Skull Island – Directed by Jordan Vogt-Roberts

In 2014, no film disappointed me more than Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla. It’s not a bad film, per se – and I do think Gareth Edwards is a talented director – but it remains one of the biggest movie disappointments over the last few years, for me. Therefore, I was, obviously, apprehensive about the next film in Warner Bros. and Legendary Entertainment’s monster movie cinematic universe.

My main issues with Godzilla were that Godzilla, essentially, had a story that was populated with mostly uninteresting characters, and that I also felt the marketing had promised me much more of both Bryan Cranston and the titular monster than we were given. Does Kong: Skull Island share those issues? Well. Yes and no. Continue reading “REVIEW: Kong: Skull Island (2017)” →

REVIEW: 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)

Theatrical Release Poster – Bad Robot – Paramount

The following is a review of ’10 Cloverfield Lane’, a Dan Trachtenberg film.

Let’s talk about expectations. The tagline of the film, “Monsters come in many forms,” is the truest representation of the film. With the original Cloverfield we were treated to a found-footage monster movie, but 10 Cloverfield Lane is a much more polished, suspenseful, and mysterious thriller. It is a very different movie, so manage your expectations. But I think I actually like 10 Cloverfield Lane more than its titular relative.  Continue reading “REVIEW: 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)” →