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The stupidly talented Riz Ahmed has recently spoken out about the wonders he’s witnessed while on the set of Digger, the new film from director Alejandro G. Iñárritu. After putting together unthinkable projects like one-take wonder, Birdman, and the beautifully bleak western, The Revenant, the director’s new film is a wild and completely original tale, which is a rarity for Cruise, who hasn’t told an original non-IP-based story in over ten years.
Digger follows Cruise as the man responsible for unleashing a disaster upon the world, and does everything he can to redeem himself and prove that he’s humanity’s savior, not its destroyer. In a recent interview with Collider, Ahmed tried to keep things hush-hush about what’s in store, but did recall his brain regularly being scrambled by the level of dedication his screen partner brought to set.
"Honestly, there’s nothing like that experience I've ever had before, just because of how motivated, focused, hardworking, and inspiring Tom Cruise is on set. The energy he has and the positivity is crazy. It's like nothing I've ever seen before,” explained Ahmed. “Then Alejandro, the attention to detail, the vision, the ambition of it, as well, every day is just like, 'Wow, this is kind of nuts.’”
Ahmed also spoke about some of the technical elements being applied in the film, which we already got a glimpse of in that gorgeous, but incredibly tantalising, teaser. Some of the credit must go to cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, who, after already winning two Oscars thanks to his work on Birdman and The Revenant, looks to be delivering the same standard this time around as well.
The Sound of Metal star spoke about watching Lubezki go to work. “I would be kind of motivated break character and go up and be like, 'What the hell are you doing? What is this that you've put up?’” Ahmed recalled. “He uses grays, and he doesn't just have one kind of gray. He has, like, 16 or 10 different shades of gray that he puts up to reflect and create different nuances. Just the level of craft and attention to detail is crazy. It just makes you want to bring your best to the table. It's inspiring. It's intense, though. It's definitely very intense.”
We’re going to have a while to wait and see just how intense things get when Ahmed and Cruise, along with Jesse Plemons, Emma D'Arcy, John Goodman, and Sandra Hüller bring Digger to theaters on October 2. While you wait, check out our list of every other big movie making its way into 2026 here.
