Tom Cruise's 'Digger' Opens to About $8 Million, One of the Worst Box Office Debuts of His Career

Tom Cruise's new film "Digger" was supposed to be an awards-season event. Instead it's shaping up to be one of the biggest money losers of 2026.

The R-rated black comedy, directed by two-time Oscar winner Alejandro G. Iñárritu, opened in theaters Friday, October 2. Thursday night previews brought in just $1.2 million, according to Variety. Friday ticket sales hit $3.4 million from 3,321 North American theaters, per data cited by Ground News. By Saturday, Deadline's tracking, cited by ScreenRant, put the full three-day domestic opening at roughly $8 million.

That's Cruise's worst opening weekend for a movie he stars in since 2007's "Lions for Lambs," which debuted with $6.7 million, according to ScreenRant. Variety had originally projected a $12-15 million opening for "Digger" just one week before release, meaning the actual number came in well below even the studio's own lowered expectations.

A Budget That Doesn't Add Up Easily

Reported figures on what "Digger" actually cost vary by outlet. CBC, citing Variety, reported the budget grew from an original $125 million to somewhere between $160 and $180 million, with Warner Bros. telling Variety its real break-even point, including marketing, is around $300 million worldwide. Variety itself put break-even closer to $350 million. ScreenRant's own math, factoring in the usual rule that films need roughly 2.5 times their budget to turn a profit, put the number as high as $400-450 million.

Breitbart's Nolte wrote that Warner Bros. "sank about $250 million" into the film between production and promotion. That figure doesn't match the production-cost numbers other outlets attribute to Variety, and it isn't tied to a specific cited source.

Either way, only eleven movies have crossed $400 million worldwide so far in 2026, according to ScreenRant. "Digger" would need to land among the year's very biggest hits just to avoid a loss. It's currently on pace for nowhere close to that.

A Twist Nobody Was Told About

Part of the film's marketing problem, according to CNN's David Mack writing for KVIA, is that "Digger" isn't the movie its trailers sold. Cruise plays Digger Rockwell, a Texas oil baron whose Greenland drilling operation destabilizes an ice shelf and triggers an apocalyptic climate disaster. But roughly a third of the way through, the film reveals itself to actually be a movie about a play about that disaster, a structural twist critics were asked by Warner Bros. not to spoil ahead of release.

New Yorker critic Justin Chang, whose review was largely positive, told CNN he found the film "an extremely obnoxious and often unlikable movie" but respected its ambition. That mixed-to-positive critical reaction sits alongside a 51% Rotten Tomatoes critics' score and a C+ CinemaScore, which Ground News reports makes "Digger" the fifth-worst CinemaScore of Cruise's entire career. Audience scores were more divided but notably higher: ScreenRant reports a 71% Popcornmeter score from moviegoers who did show up.

The Daily Wire's review took the opposite path from Chang, calling the film a "bloated, joyless satire" that compares itself to Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove" but, unlike Kubrick, "only knows whom it wants you to despise." Whether the film's one-sided satire undercuts its artistic ambitions, as Daily Wire argues, or whether its meta-structure is the point, as Chang argues, is a genuine critical disagreement that the box office numbers alone don't settle.

Cruise, for his part, has publicly defended the project. According to Ground News, he wrote on X that he's "proud" of the film despite the reception, and he did an extensive press push including an appearance on "The Jennifer Hudson Show."

The Bigger Picture at Warner Bros.

"Digger" isn't an isolated flop. It's the last release from Warner Bros. Discovery as a standalone studio before its contested $111 billion merger with Paramount Skydance is set to close October 6, 2026, according to Ground News and ScreenRant. CBC notes the film follows a string of 2026 underperformers at the studio, including "The Bride!", "Supergirl," "The End of Oak Street" and "Practical Magic 2," a sharp reversal from Warner Bros.' 2025 run that included hits like "Sinners," "F1" and "Superman."

"Digger" also got beat on its own opening weekend. Amazon MGM's Colleen Hoover adaptation "Verity" took the top box office spot Friday with $15.1 million, on track for a $33 million weekend, according to Ground News.

What happens to "Digger" from here depends largely on international grosses and any Oscar-season momentum from critics like Chang. But with a domestic opening around $8 million against production costs alone north of $160 million, the math Warner Bros. now has to climb out of is steep. The studio will be doing that math under new ownership within days.