In the arid landscape of derivative and unoriginal horror movies, the sight of something different can act like discovering a wellspring. Saying that S. Craig Zahler’s Bone Tomahawk is a wholly original film would be disingenuous. Zahler hasn’t created something new so much as re-arranged what’s already there into a beguiling and (eventually) nasty combination. First and foremost a western, Bone Tomahawk teases its gradual turn to the sadistic and bloody with its opening sequence before settling into its own unique groove. If anything, Zahler has immediately established himself as one to watch in genre filmmaking right now by creating something no one else is doing right now.

The aforementioned opening finds murderers/thieves Purvis (David Arquette) and Buddy (Sid Haig) stumbling on (and desecrating) the burial ground of a group of cave-dwelling cannibals. Cut to 11 days later, where Purvis takes shelter in the small town of Bright Hope, only to get arrested by Sheriff Hunt (Kurt Russell) and his deputy Chicory (Richard Jenkins). But Purvis isn’t aware that the cave dwellers have been tracking him, and overnight they kidnap Purvis, Deputy Nick (Evan Jonigkeit) and town doctor Samantha (Lili Simmons). Hunt and Chicory decide to head out on a rescue mission to bring back Nick and Samantha, bringing two more townsmen with them: Samantha’s husband Arthur (Patrick Wilson), recovering from a broken leg, and Brooder (Matthew Fox), a handsome gunslinger who claims to have killed more Indians than anyone else in town.

Not that the villains in Bone Tomahawk are Indians, as Zahler is quick to point out through a Native American character who refers to them as “troglodytes.” It might be easy to label the film as a revisionist western given its realism and subversion of genre clichés but, for the most part, it feels like Zahler is just creating his own strange universe within the Wild West. This extends to Zahler’s screenplay, which revels in stylized dialogue that will have fans of Deadwood feeling nostalgic (in this film, “Can you be quiet?” becomes “Is it possible for you to close that aperture?”). Zahler, a novelist making his directorial debut here, has a great sense of humour too, giving his cast plenty of opportunities to revel in his script’s seemingly endless turns of phrase.

It also helps that Zahler has assembled a seriously impressive cast for his first feature. The presence of a familiar face like Kurt Russell as Sheriff Hunt elevates the character significantly, along with the inclusion of character actors in every other major role. Matthew Fox plays directly against type as the ruthlessly pragmatic and vain Brooder, but he sells the role perfectly, looking like he’s thriving on the chance to show off a side of himself that hasn’t really been given the opportunity to shine before. At first, Patrick Wilson looks typecast as yet another portrait of wounded masculinity (this time in a more literal sense), but his casting feels like a subversion of Wilson’s previous roles once he completes his character’s arc. It’s the best role Wilson has had in years, but if an MVP had to be selected out of the cast it would have to be Richard Jenkins. He’s almost unrecognizable as the bearded, oafish Chicory, providing both the comedic relief for the film along with its beating heart once more details emerge about his past. It’s bound to go down as one of the year’s most underrated performances.

But the most surprising thing about Bone Tomahawk isn’t its screenplay or its merging of two genres that usually stay separate; it’s the film’s breathing room that helps the film stand on its own. The 132-minute runtime is a rare sight these days for a low-budget (under $2 million to be precise, an astonishing figure given how good the movie looks) genre movie, but Zahler’s writing skills and his cast make it hard to find a single dull moment. Each scene, no matter how much it might feel like a total non-sequitur or detour from the main narrative, always keeps the focus on character. And, admittedly, this makes the final act’s sudden shift into the grotesque all the more impactful. The less said about Bone Tomahawk’s horror elements the better (it’s best to watch it unfold without knowing anything), but its drastic turn into a bloody gorefest certainly leaves an impression with one of the most brutal death scenes ever put in a film. And Zahler shows his skills as a filmmaker by having this tonal shift work, using the strength of his characters to carry along the change in circumstances. Zahler’s curious approach might not work all the time, and the meshing of two disparate genres doesn’t always come together nicely, but it makes for a fascinating and (mostly) entertaining experience.

It sounds like an out there sitcom pitch: Two former friends with old grudges forced to live next door to one another on a country estate because the zombie apocalypse has left them as possibly the only survivors and the world has become an icy wasteland. Oh, the antics that could ensue! Arguing over property lines. Squabbles over one neighbor’s late night penchant for loud music, and even irritations about the blasted neighborhood dog. On paper, Miguel Ángel Vivas’s Extinction technically fits this silly description, but considering the very serious tone of the film, he clearly decided not to veer toward a laugh track and instead play this one straight. Except it’s just a little too hard to swallow, and in the sludge of its seriousness, Extinction is sorely lacking in any relief of tension.

Starring a ruggedly long-haired Matthew Fox as Patrick, and a deliberately contrasted and clean-cut Jeffrey Donovan as Jack, the film opens at the start of a zombie-style epidemic. Short-haired Patrick, Jack, and their shared love interest, Emma, are on a bus headed to some sort of military safe zone. Emma has a small baby in her arms, and when the bus is suddenly stopped due to troubles outside, she does her best to keep the child calm. Vivas doesn’t delve too deeply into the origins of the infected, but it becomes apparent that once bitten these people turn quickly and are fiercely aggressive. When the obtuse military men exit the bus to scope out the situation they quickly fall victim and the entire bus goes into a panic. Patrick, Jack and Emma escape but not without injury. Emma is bitten and Patrick has to chop off her arm to save her.

Flash forward to the present where Patrick has adopted his long-haired look and snowmobiles around New York City hunting food. Back at the country homestead in the kitschily titled town of Harmony, Patrick lives next door to Jack and Lu (Quinn McColgan), the now 9-year old child Emma once protected. With no sign of Emma, it’s not hard to guess the source of the animosity that separates Jack and Patrick. They live in their houses, several layers of chain-link fence dividing them. Patrick likes to get drunk with his dog and nightly broadcasts through the radio searching for any other survivors. Jack maintains a strict household with Lu, playing the dutiful father determined to give his daughter as close to a normal human upbringing as possible. Her television time is limited—she watches old cartoons powered by their gas generator—and her studies encouraged, but she’s of a curious age and her questions about the world get increasingly more complicated. Especially as they relate to her curiosity in Patrick and her love of his dog.

But Extinction can’t seem to decide where it would like the meat of its content to lie, so almost as soon as the relational dynamics get interesting, the focus pivots and turns to the outside world where the infected humans have apparently not all died off due to the cold, but instead adapted. Forget that science tells us true evolutionary adaptation takes hundreds of thousands of years, in this version of the world it takes about 10 years. Which Patrick discovers when out hunting one day. He encounters an all white, blind, and sharp-toothed version of the zombies he encountered years before. Somehow the creatures have evolved to live in the intense cold and for whatever reason decided they didn’t need sight but use sound to hunt instead. Oh, and they have nasty little mouths that have developed on the sides of their heads with extra teeth and the ability to communicate.

Of course, these monsters are terrifying to behold, but Vivas makes a distinct beeline toward creature-feature by deciding not to take advantage of the inherent horror in the human-ness of zombies (though he is working with the content from Juan de Dios Garduño’s novel Y pese a todo…, which likely elaborates on the creatures origins more). The film then goes on to parry back and forth awkwardly between this new and violent threat and Lu’s innocent and child-like efforts to reunite Jack and Patrick as friends. The introduction of a new survivor provides a new hope for the larger picture of humanity, but Jack and Patrick have hardly a moment to argue over the sanity of staying put versus finding others when they are attacked by a slew of creatures. All of which leads to a predictable ending and a sincere lack of emotional reconciliation.

Fox and Donovan are both accomplished actors and play their part with as much sincerity as they can muster, but Vivas uses McColgan and her bright little smile to provide the only bit of warmth to this cold film. I’m open to childlike manipulation as much as the next person, and her sway on the characters is endearing, but she becomes a pawn in the film’s tawdry plot development. The most obvious sign of Vivas’s attempts to add gravitas to a predictable thriller is in the almost comically over-animated CG sunsets glittering off the white snow-covered hillsides of the film’s setting. The sun appears to be ten times its normal size—which, if true, would scientifically mean this world would be warmer not colder—and reminded me, maybe because of the farm setting, of The Wizard of Oz. But for all its attempts to take us through the necessity of human connection, the bonds formed in the film feel as fleeting and forced as the character’s delusions of safety.

Heavy-handed in both its horror elements and its emotions, Extinction ends up lacking in both real frights and real attachments.