There’s a bonanza of commentary about Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s Digger and why it flopped and what this means for Tom Cruise. But this week, the Hollywood Reporter dared to remind everyone that Digger was directed by a Mexican man, and he’s friends with other Oscar-winning Mexican directors! Seriously. This is from THR’s “As ‘Digger’ Sinks, Hollywood’s Three Amigos Close Ranks.” It’s about how Alfonso Cuarón and Guillermo del Toro are simply defending their dear friend Alejandro G. Iñárritu. Which is apparently quite sinister to the trade papers. Friendly Mexican directors are congregating!!

As Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s Digger entered a box-office death spiral, two familiar defenders appeared. Guillermo del Toro blasted as “entirely petty” an IGN post suggesting moviegoers save their money and wait to stream the Tom Cruise vehicle, whose budget has been estimated as high as $180 million, praising Digger instead for its ambition and theatrical scale.

Alfonso Cuarón, meanwhile, posted a series of old critical pans of a number of films whose regard grew exponentially, Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Metropolis and The Shining among them.

It looked like two members of the Mexican filmmaking triumvirate long ago christened “the Three Amigos” closing ranks around the third. In fact, they have been doing some version of this for nearly three decades. Long before the Oscars and nine-figure budgets, Cuarón, del Toro and Iñárritu became each other’s private critics, advisers and occasional unofficial editors, quietly shaping films from Amores Perros and Y Tu Mamá También to Gravity, Birdman and Crimson Peak.

The trio really took shape around Amores Perros. Cuarón encouraged Iñárritu to show his 2000 debut to del Toro, who according to a 2006 Los Angeles Times profile watched it, called Iñárritu early in the morning and told him two things: He had made a masterpiece, and it was too long. Soon del Toro was in Mexico City arguing with Iñárritu over the edit.

It established a pattern. Over the years, the three became trusted sounding boards on one another’s films. For a time they even formalized the relationship, creating Cha Cha Cha Films in 2007 and striking a production deal with Universal.

Beginning with Cuarón’s win for Gravity in 2014, the Three Amigos won the directing Oscar an astounding five times in six years: Cuarón twice, Iñárritu twice and del Toro once. Three friends from Mexico had come close to monopolizing Hollywood’s highest directing honor. Now there is Digger.

[From THR]

I struggled to find the point or perspective of this piece. Like, yes, it’s newsworthy that Iñárritu’s two closest Hollywood allies (and countrymen) have been vocal in their defense of his flop. But THR wants to imply that this is all some sort of conspiracy, or that Cuaron and del Toro are not to be trusted if they can’t “tell the truth” about Digger. When really, maybe they genuinely like Digger, and/or they love their friend and they don’t want to add to the wall-to-wall criticism he’s gotten. Have you ever heard Steven Spielberg or George Lucas bad-mouth Francis Ford Coppola’s crazy ass? Of course not – because they came up together and friends don’t publicly bad-mouth friends.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.