Updated

Updated · Ars Technica · Jul 13

Warner Bros. Releases 1st Official 'Digger' Trailer, Revealing Tom Cruise's Oil Baron Transformation

Updated

Updated · Ars Technica · Jul 13

Warner Bros. Releases 1st Official 'Digger' Trailer, Revealing Tom Cruise's Oil Baron Transformation

Q: Will shooting on vintage 1950s cameras give 'Digger' a timeless feel or seem like a gimmick?

It is more likely to give *Digger* a timeless feel than come off as a gimmick. The key reason is that VistaVision is not being used here as a novelty prop but as part of a serious high-end visual strategy. The format, developed in the 1950s, exposes a larger area of 35mm film, which typically produces finer grain, greater clarity and a richer, more organic image than standard 35mm. That can create the kind of large-format, classic cinematic texture filmmakers often describe as timeless. The creative team matters too. Alejandro G. Iñárritu and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki have strong reputations for using format and technique in service of mood and immersion, not nostalgia for its own sake. Their choice places *Digger* in line with a recent VistaVision revival on prestige projects, including *The Brutalist* and other director-driven films, suggesting the format is being treated as an artistic tool rather than a marketing hook. That said, whether audiences see it as timeless will depend on execution. If the visual language supports the film’s satirical, apocalyptic tone, the vintage cameras will likely deepen its identity. If the movie draws too much attention to the format itself, some viewers may still read it as self-conscious style. Based on the evidence so far, the odds favor substance over stunt: VistaVision appears to be part of *Digger*’s attempt to look distinctive, expansive and durable, not merely retro.

3 articles · Updated · Ars Technica · Jul 13

Warner Bros. released the first full official trailer for “Digger,” giving the public its clearest look yet at Tom Cruise as eccentric billionaire oil baron Digger Rockwell.
The footage frames the film as a satirical black comedy in which “the most powerful man in the world” tries to cast himself as humanity’s savior before a disaster he unleashed destroys everything.
That disaster appears ecological, with the trailer pointing to a rapidly melting iceberg and nuclear waste while evoking a modern “Dr. Strangelove”-style tone.
The film marks Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s first English-language feature since 2015’s “The Revenant” and is set for an Oct. 2 theatrical release.