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John Goodman has hit back at critics of his latest film Digger.
The politically-charged satire, which also stars Tom Cruise, has divided critics on top of bombing at the box office following its release last month.
Now Goodman, 74, has admitted that he was 'hurt' by the critical reception that the arthouse blockbuster received, even going as far as to imply that it may have hurt the film's box office performance.
'They kinda killed us before we opened,' he told host Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast.
Goodman said that many of the early headlines around the film were predicting that it would 'only make five dollars', which he said then became 'a good reason for people to avoid it'.
Despite the backlash, Goodman defended the divisive film and said that he believes it will have longevity.
John Goodman says that scathing reviews of his latest film Digger 'hurt' the film at the box office
'I'm proud of it. I had a ball doing it. It was a good six months out of my life,' he said, before calling the Alejandro González Iñárritu-directed film 'a big swing'.
'It's gonna be around for a long time,' he added, before admitting that he was happy to see a positive review for Digger in the New Yorker.
During its opening weekend, Digger grossed just $8million in US theaters, with international sales of $12million from 74 countries.
Ticket sales for the movie declined by 60 per cent in its second weekend, bringing its tally to $14.4million domestically and $35.3million globally.
With a budget estimated to be as high as $170million before marketing costs, Digger is now considered to be one of the biggest box office bombs of all time.
The satirical black comedy sees Cruise play a wealthy oil tycoon who unleashes an environmental disaster and then tries to prove he is the only man capable of saving the world. Goodman plays the US president.
Digger is one of the few awards-focused movies that Cruise has starred in for almost three decades and is directed by four-time Oscar winner Iñárritu, who is known for his work on Birdman and The Revenant.
Some Hollywood insiders suggest that the movie star could still be on course for his first Oscar, despite the biggest box office flop of his career.
The politically-charged satire, which stars Tom Cruise, divided critics on top of bombing at the box office following its release last month
Despite the backlash, Cruise is still tipped to potentially earn an Oscar nomination for his role
The awards-tracking website Gold Derby currently has Cruise in fifth place for a Best Actor nomination, but caution the 2027 category is a hotly contested race with Andrew Scott (Elsinore), John Malkovich (Wild Horse Nine), Matt Damon (The Odyssey) and Ryan Gosling (Project Hail Mary) all thought to be shoo-ins for a nod.
Digger has been much better received by European critics, many of whom have hailed it a masterpiece despite the wave of negative reviews from American media outlets.
On Rotten Tomatoes, Digger has a surprisingly high audience score of 77%, despite the critical score languishing at just 53%.
Digger has earned a few high-profile defenders, including Anne Hathaway, Jane Fonda, Guillermo del Toro, and Ben Affleck.
Comedian Bill Burr has also been a vocal defender of the film, recently blasting Digger's critics as 'out of their minds'.
'Tom Cruise is unbelievable. He should win the Oscar for that. Him and John Goodman were unbelievable,' Burr gushed.
'These f***ing critics, all they do is bitch: "Oh, another Marvel movie? Blah blah blah." And then when they do something different, not only do they trash it, they don’t even understand it,' he continued.
'The stuff that they say we’re headed toward, and they do it in satire, it’s amazing. It's one of the most original, and there’s a left turn that is so f***ing original. At first I was like, "What are they doin?" And then it works.'
English (US) ·