Key Takeaways
- • Carnegie Endowment senior fellow Leonardo Martinez-Diaz argues that the Alejandro González Iñárritu film "Digger" may be the most influential climate movie yet, despite its weak box-office performance and criticism from both political left and right.
- • The commentary identifies three ways the film shapes the climate conversation: it dramatizes "New Denialism," it spotlights methane as a climate tipping-point risk, and it raises the question of how societies process ecological grief.
- • Martinez-Diaz cites the 2021 multilateral methane pledges and the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act methane fee, noting the fee was scrapped by the Big Beautiful Bill Act in 2025.
- • The author writes that the film's proposed "solutions" are late and futile, which is why many climate advocates disliked it, but he argues its cultural impact on public consciousness is significant.
Summary
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace senior fellow Leonardo Martinez-Diaz, director of the Sustainability, Climate, and Geopolitics Program, argues in a commentary published October 9, 2026 that the feature film "Digger" may be the most influential climate movie yet. He notes the film has drawn criticism across the political spectrum, with right-leaning reviewers calling it "farcical and dull" and climate-progressive critics calling it "the most disappointing film of the year." The film, directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu and starring Tom Cruise, follows Digger Rockwell, an oil and gas tycoon presiding over a disaster in which a giant ice piece breaks off an ice sheet and strikes Northern Europe. Martinez-Diaz notes the scenario echoes a real event: a glacier collapse in Nepal six weeks before the film's release caused floods that killed over 1,400 people.
Martinez-Diaz says the film's first contribution is its portrayal of "New Denialism," a term he and colleagues use for the view that climate change is real and human-caused but that decarbonization is unrealistic and that the U.S. can double down on fossil fuels. He cites Energy Secretary Chris Wright describing climate change as a "modest negative trade-off" of progress, and argues this position is effectively the official stance of the U.S. government. He points to a scene in which Rockwell addresses the European Parliament, which he characterizes as embodying the central tenets of New Denialism. He notes that Americans remain more likely to prioritize renewable energy, but that support has dropped more than twenty points since 2020.
His second point concerns methane, which he describes as roughly thirty times as potent as carbon dioxide over a century and about eighty times more potent over twenty years. The film depicts methane release as creating a feedback loop, with the line "CO2 is the trigger, but methane is the bomb." Martinez-Diaz notes that multilateral methane pledges were made in 2021 and that the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act included a methane fee, which he says was swiftly scrapped by the Big Beautiful Bill Act in 2025.
Third, he argues the film poses the question of how society will process ecological grief, or solastalgia, which he says is growing among younger generations. He notes that the film proposes cultural production and retroactive accountability as coping mechanisms. He contrasts the film with "Don't Look Up" (2021) and "How to Blow Up a Pipeline" (2022), arguing that Digger is the first mainstream film to explore this territory and may spark conversation about collective response to climate loss.
Martinez-Diaz says the film's first contribution is its portrayal of "New Denialism," a term he and colleagues use for the view that climate change is real and human-caused but that decarbonization is unrealistic and that the U.S. can double down on fossil fuels. He cites Energy Secretary Chris Wright describing climate change as a "modest negative trade-off" of progress, and argues this position is effectively the official stance of the U.S. government. He points to a scene in which Rockwell addresses the European Parliament, which he characterizes as embodying the central tenets of New Denialism. He notes that Americans remain more likely to prioritize renewable energy, but that support has dropped more than twenty points since 2020.
His second point concerns methane, which he describes as roughly thirty times as potent as carbon dioxide over a century and about eighty times more potent over twenty years. The film depicts methane release as creating a feedback loop, with the line "CO2 is the trigger, but methane is the bomb." Martinez-Diaz notes that multilateral methane pledges were made in 2021 and that the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act included a methane fee, which he says was swiftly scrapped by the Big Beautiful Bill Act in 2025.
Third, he argues the film poses the question of how society will process ecological grief, or solastalgia, which he says is growing among younger generations. He notes that the film proposes cultural production and retroactive accountability as coping mechanisms. He contrasts the film with "Don't Look Up" (2021) and "How to Blow Up a Pipeline" (2022), arguing that Digger is the first mainstream film to explore this territory and may spark conversation about collective response to climate loss.
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