Digger may have struggled at the box office, but its audience continues to debate the film and its ideas. Hideo Kojima is now among its supporters, praising the film’s approach to climate catastrophe, misinformation and the uneasy relationship between reality and the stories people consume.
The creator of Metal Gear called Digger “a film that all of us living in today’s world should see” on his social media accounts. In a conversation with director Alejandro González Iñárritu for Gizmodo Japan, Kojima explained why the film reminded him of Metal Gear Solid 2.
A frightening story told through comedy
Digger combines comedy and intense drama while examining climate disaster and the spread of false information. Its use of absurdist satire has prompted comparisons with Stanley Kubrick’s Dr Strangelove and Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator, films that use exaggerated situations to make audiences confront the condition of the real world.
Kojima was particularly struck by the film’s structure. Rather than relying on an extraterrestrial attack or a meteor striking Earth, Digger draws its fear from events and pressures already present in everyday life. He described it as a work that blends cinema with theatre, eventually feeling like a play presented as part of history rather than a story set in the future.
“It’s not a story where meteorites fall from the sky or aliens attack, instead capturing things that are actually happening in reality,” Kojima said. He added that the film’s frightening subject matter may be exactly what allows its comedy to work.
Why Kojima sees Metal Gear Solid 2 in Digger
The connection to Metal Gear Solid 2 comes through the films’ and game’s treatment of information systems. Kojima noted that social media did not exist in its current form when he made the game, yet its story imagined a world where information networks developed a life of their own.
He sees a similar structure in Digger: misinformation moves rapidly through social platforms, influencing politics and daily life while leaving people uncertain about what is genuine. The film’s world creates the sensation that its characters are being pushed by forces they cannot identify or control. For Kojima, that anxiety now extends beyond climate change to the possibility of becoming trapped in a digital environment where truth is difficult to recognise.
That concern fits comfortably alongside the themes explored in games and interactive entertainment. RETROCADE’s arcade blog covers the wider conversations surrounding gaming, technology and the culture built around play.
Opinions formed before anyone sees the film
Iñárritu agreed that shared reality is becoming harder to maintain. He described people as living among “fragmented truths within our smartphones”, with discussion about Digger often shaped by surrounding narratives rather than by the film itself. In his view, people can develop firm opinions about a work they have not experienced.
Kojima connected that idea with the reception of his own game, Death Stranding. He recalled that people who had not played it still described it as “just a walking simulator”, a label that continues to influence how the game is perceived.
He also pointed to the growing role of artificial intelligence in social media. Recommendation systems can narrow what people encounter, showing them material they already enjoy while filtering out opposing views. Kojima compared this to being guided by an unseen force, much like the people manipulated within Digger.
AI, personalisation and the loss of common ground
Kojima’s concern is that AI could become a concierge for every part of life. If systems continually serve only preferred foods, opinions and social connections, people may stop encountering anyone or anything that challenges their assumptions. The unsettling question, he argues, is who or what is directing those choices.
That tension between technology, control and individual perception has long been central to Kojima’s work. It also reflects why stories such as Digger can attract strong reactions before audiences have had the chance to judge them directly. For more visual discussion of arcade and gaming culture, explore RETROCADE’s arcade videos.
Kojima’s continuing connection with cinema
Kojima’s interest in film is well established, and his work with A24 reflects his continuing move towards cinema. He has often considered where games and films overlap and where their different forms create separate possibilities.
He has also connected with the director of Backrooms, another filmmaker whose work resonated with his concerns about the future. In Digger, Kojima appears to have found another creative kindred spirit—one using satire and fear to examine a world shaped by climate anxiety, misinformation and increasingly personalised technology.
Whether or not viewers agree with the film’s approach, Kojima’s comparison gives Digger an intriguing place in the conversation around Metal Gear Solid 2. Both works ask what happens when information becomes powerful enough to shape behaviour, yet opaque enough that ordinary people can no longer see who is pulling the strings.
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