In “Digger,” Tom Cruise plays a powerful oil magnate preparing for an ecological disaster of epic proportions. But nothing could have prepared him for the disaster that ensued at the box office, where “Digger” collapsed with an embarrassing $8 million from 3,321 theaters in North America. Opponents believe the figure will be closer to $7.5 million when final numbers are tallied on Monday.
With a production budget of $160 million to $180 million, “Digger” will be not only one of the biggest bombs of the year, but potentially one of the biggest bombs of all time. Warner Bros. hoped that the combination of Tom Cruise, one of the world’s biggest movie stars, and director Alejandro González Iñárritu, whose credits include critical and commercial successes such as “Birdman” and “The Revenant,” would at least increase the initial gross to $18 million to $20 million. And even those ticket sales would be financially disastrous for the big-budget film. Box office experts say a movie of this size would need an opening close to $40 million to justify its price tag. These estimates were revised downward (and revised downward again) following a series of bad news. The R-rated satire opened in fifth place, behind another newcomer, Anne Hathaway and Dakota Johnson’s psychological thriller “Verity,” and three veterans, including “Resident Evil” and “Heart of the Beast.”
“The numbers aren’t bad for a black comedy. But black comedies are small movies, and this is not a small movie. This is a Tom Cruise movie,” says analyst David A. Gross of Franchise Re. “Comedy walks a fine line and when it misses misses.”
Reviews and word of mouth about “Digger” were so negative that Warner Bros. tried to embrace the negative press. After critics called the film “distasteful” and “surprising,” the studio told moviegoers to “judge for yourself” in a recent commercial. Another marketing spot suggested that American audiences alone didn’t like “Digger.” But the film was equally rejected at the international box office, earning a tragic $12 million from 73 international markets for a global start of $20 million.
“Digger” was always a gamble as a big-budget, star-driven, R-rated original comedy. Warner Bros. He greenlit the film for $125 million, but after production took a long time, the price tag quickly rose. Since the studio spent another $100 million on global marketing efforts, “Digger” has a worldwide theatrical breakeven point of about $350 million, according to executives with knowledge of similar films. A Warner Bros. A spokesman turned down the offer, saying the film’s break-even point was $300 million. Either way, “Digger” is poised to lose at least $150 million to $200 million theatrically. (Theatre owners keep roughly half of ticket sales.) The studio’s profitability will take even longer because Cruise gets first-dollar gross, meaning he gets a percentage of the revenue before the studio covers any expenses.
“Even if it has significant ancillary revenue based on the film’s track record, the film is going to lose a lot of money,” Gross says, citing revenue streams such as digital rentals, merchandising, streaming and TV licensing.
Warner Bros. has suffered misfires like “Digger,” “The Bride” and “Supergirl.” It extends a bleak year for , and its timing was terrible. Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. will be completed next week. On Friday, news broke that Warner co-chiefs Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy will be leaving the studio when the merger closes on October 6. The duo achieved tremendous box office revenue in 2025 with amazing hits such as “Sinners”, “A Minecraft Movie” and “Weapons”. But after a series of major swings toward 2026, not a single film has managed to surpass $100 million domestically.
This time last year, few in Hollywood expected “Verity” to beat “Digger” at the domestic box office. Amazon MGM’s adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s best-selling novel ranked first with $32.6 million from 3,510 theaters. This marks Hathaway’s third No. 1 opening of 2026, following this summer’s blockbusters “The Devil Wears Prada 2” and “The Odyssey.” Hathaway, who is very pregnant, recently joked that she would disappear for the rest of the year.
“Verity” collected another $30 million at the international box office, bringing its worldwide gross to $62.5 million.
Directed by “The Big Sick” filmmaker Michael Showalter, “Verity” centers on acclaimed author Verity Crawford (Hathaway), who is severely injured in a car accident and recruits her husband (Josh Hartnett), a struggling author (Johnson), to complete the remaining books in the popular series. Reviews and word of mouth were negative; The film received a “C+” rating on CinemaScore and a 34% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. But “Verity” was produced for $40 million and is expected to make a profit for Amazon MGM.
“This is the perfect opening,” says Gross. “The reception doesn’t hurt the film. Audiences come in large numbers.”
Hollywood is eager to bring Hoover’s novels to the big screen because her works appeal to an underserved female population and her film adaptations carry modest production budgets, making them low-risk bets for studios. While 78% of the crowd at “Verity’s” opening weekend was women, the largest age demo (38%) was 25 to 34 years old. Among Hoover’s adaptations, “Verity” has the second-biggest debut behind Sony’s 2024 sleeper “It Ends With Us” ($50 million) and ahead of Paramount’s 2025 film “Regretting You” ($13.6 million) and Universal’s 2026 film “Reminders of Him” ($17 million). “It Ends With Us” became by far the trio’s highest-grossing film with $350 million worldwide.
With general audiences rejecting “Digger,” Sony’s rebooted video game “Resident Evil” came in second place with $12.5 million in its third weekend of release. The R-rated film, directed by Zach Cregger of “Weapons” fame, has so far grossed a strong $124.8 million domestically and $215 million worldwide on a $75 million budget.
“Resident Evil” became Sony’s second consecutive box office hit after “Spider-Man: Brand New Day,” which grossed $954 million in North America and $2.5 billion worldwide. It is the third highest-grossing film in history, behind “Avengers: Endgame” ($2.925 billion) and “Avatar” ($2.923 billion). Thanks to Disney’s recent re-release of “Avengers: Endgame,” the Marvel giant has once again become the biggest game of all time, raking in a whopping $126 million over two weekends. Disney has re-released the blockbuster (with extra footage) to build excitement for “Avengers: Doomsday,” which hits the big screen in December.
Third place was “Heart of the Beast” with $11 million, a 45% drop in its second release. The Brad Pitt-led survival thriller has grossed $38.3 million in North America so far and $98.6 million worldwide, and will soon surpass the $100 million mark. Paramount will rely on “Heart of the Beast” maintaining strength and traction at the international box office to offset its theatrical success, as it spent $82 million producing the well-reviewed film.
“Primetime,” a psychological drama starring Robert Pattinson as “To Catch a Predator” host Chris Hansen, ranked No. 4 with $8 million in its second weekend. That’s a steeper decline of 58% since the strong opening of $19 million. So far, “Primetime” has grossed $34 million in North America against a modest budget of $15 million. The film, backed by A24, is yet to be released in most international territories.
More to come…