“Digger,” the offbeat end-of-the-world satire starring Tom Cruise, is on track to lose a staggering $250 million by the end of its run, TheWrap has learned, even when factoring in post-theatrical revenue. This is by far the biggest loss for the movie star, and one of the biggest movie release losses in recent years.
Skydance executives were shocked to learn the extent of the Warner Bros. film’s loss. directed by Alejandro G. Iñárritu during the company’s sale this week.
Previous reports put the expected loss at around $125 million, but it was expected to be larger after earning just $8 million domestically and $21 million worldwide at the box office in its opening weekend.
The film is not expected to exceed $40 million at the worldwide box office, according to Skydance insiders.
A representative from Warner Bros. made no comment.
The film’s budget, according to several sources, was $173 million, part of which was due to an unexpected insurance settlement. Another insider estimated the final budget at $163 million. The marketing budget was around $100 million, mostly tied to Cruise’s global press tour.
The film was also fully financed by Warner Bros., unlike other projects like “Dune,” which often have financial partners.
The film, in which Cruise plays a wealthy oil tycoon whose wells trigger a global environmental catastrophe, garnered mixed reviews, with some finding the film confusing while others praised it as daring and comically over-the-top.
Cruise is barely recognizable as Digger, a paunchy, balding billionaire living with a dying cat among mounted stuffed animals.
“Digger” was one of several major changes made by Warner Bros. executives’ auteur filmmakers. Pictures, Pam Abdy and Mike De Luca. Some worked, like “Sinners” ($327 million, 4 Oscars) and “One Battle After Another” ($213 million, 6 Oscars, including best picture). Others, like “The Bride!” » by Maggie Gyllenhaal. ($24 million), it is not.
But “Digger” was considered a coup when it was first greenlit (by David Zaslav himself, TheWrap reports), because it marked the first film in a new pact with Cruise — one of the world’s biggest movie stars — to make original films and franchises with Warner Bros. Pairing him with Iñárritu, one of only three directors to win consecutive Best Director Oscars, seemed like a no-brainer. But after a decade and a half of entertaining audiences by showing he could pull off truly real, death-defying stunts, Cruise’s appeal hasn’t morphed into a prosthetic-heavy transformation in a climate change satire.
De Luca and Abdy were fired by David Ellison, who put Paramount’s Dana Goldberg and Josh Greenstein in charge of overseeing production of the films for Paramount and Warner Bros. under the new Skydance.
They’ll try again for a Tom Cruise hit in “Days of Thunder 2,” which begins production next year for Paramount and co-stars Anne Hathaway.
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