As a small-scale Sundance character drama, writer-director Matt Sobel’s debut feature defies a handful of natural expectations. In its first act, Take Me to the River follows Ryder (Logan Miller), an openly gay California teen who wants to come out to his extended family during a visit to their farm in Nebraska. But his mother (Robin Weigert) and father (Richard Schiff) are considerably nervous about the consequences that would manifest if their conservative relatives were to learn the truth about Ryder’s sexuality. Sobel often goes out of his way to illustrate the level of social ineptitude that permeates the family. One blind relative, maybe an aunt, actually touches Ryder’s leg when she hears from others about the length of his shorts. In addition to this, Ryder is asked about girls and whether he has a girlfriend on multiple occasions. This initial conflict allows viewers to sympathize with Ryder quickly, but it doesn’t say anything new about what it’s like to be gay in America. It’s a good thing Sobel isn’t done setting up his story.

It’s perhaps worth noting that, while the teenage and adult members of Ryder’s extended family sneer at his queer appearance, the kids seem to adore it. One of his nieces, Molly (Ursula Parker), is particularly drawn to him and convinces her redneck dad Keith (Josh Hamilton) to allow them to search a nearby barn for birds’ nests. But something happens in the barn that results in Molly tearing back toward the gathered family with a bloodstain near her crotch. The accusations from her father are instantaneous and damning: Ryder is a pervert who has, in one way or another, assaulted and injured his daughter. The mysterious cause of the bloodstain could be anything from a fall to a cut to a case of premature menstruation, but Sobel avoids getting to the bottom of this enigmatic rising action. In this crucial early moment, and in many thereafter, Sobel insists on employing cinema’s eternally overvalued subterfuge: ambiguity.

Because key developments are so murkily communicated, the otherwise straightforward world of Take Me to the River often registers as surreal and dreamlike. This enhances the film aesthetically but cripples it narratively. Sobel doesn’t venture far enough into the skeletons in the closets of the quarreling relatives to properly grasp the tension boiling under nearly every scene. The framework of his story suggests an exploration of conflicting American mindsets, yet the actions of the characters are left shrouded in mystery when they could be used to reveal much more about what’s actually going on.

Misplaced obscurity aside, Sobel does do an impressive job of enhancing individual scenes. Whatever’s going on, there’s usually something engaging about the frame. Sobel will often inject queer imagery into the film’s redneck-laden Nebraska landscape. One shot, for example, depicts Ryder and one of his nieces riding small horses over a hill blanketed entirely by shimmering yellow flowers. Keeping in mind that Ryder’s nieces are the only members of his extended family with speaking roles who accept him, it’s almost as though the shot is conveying their environment’s satisfaction at being momentarily occupied only by people who accept each other.

More of what glues Sobel’s debut together is the strength of his cast. Robin Weigert is a standout as Ryder’s mother, embodying a woman clinging to a sliver of resolve to protect her son with deft skill. Logan Miller is also quite convincing in the central role. But the most impressive work might come from Ursula Parker, who seems to fully grasp the implications of her role in the film and uses that level of understanding to her advantage. Her ability to grasp complex concepts and then apply them to her character is astonishing considering she can’t be more than twelve or thirteen. Take Me to the River proves Sobel is a talented director, one who knows how to frame a shot so it’s visually explorable. If he would’ve been able to dig deeper into key plot elements rather than expecting the audience to fill in the gaps for him, he would’ve had quite the noteworthy first feature.

Cold Comes the Night is the sophomore effort from indie director Tze Chun, who teams up with Nick Simon and Osgood Perkins on a screenplay about a single mother who is forced into criminal activities for the well being of her child. A brisk 90-minute runtime keeps the film from feeling overlong, however, characters are still allowed to make too many bad decisions within its duration. Cold Comes the Night remains mostly forgettable despite its efforts to be something a little more substantial.

Set in an isolated town near the Catskill Mountains, a single mother named Chloe (Alice Eve) prepares breakfast for her adorable daughter Sophia (Ursula Parker) in what appears to be just an ordinary kitchen. But as soon as the camera catches a glimpse out the window, it reveals that the two are actually living in a low-rent motel that Chloe manages. Because drug dealers and prostitutes mainly use this motel, social service decides to step in by threatening to take away her child if the two do not relocate to a safer environment within two weeks. Chloe is determined to keep her child and is willing to do whatever it takes to do so.

Enter Bryan Cranston as a Russian mobster named Topo. As fate would have it, Topo spends a night at the sketchy motel during a money-mule operation. An unexpected incident occurs overnight that threatens the operation when the vehicle carrying the large sum of cash ends up in the hands of a crooked local cop (Logan Marshall-Green). In order to help retrieve his money, the man sporting red shades forces Chloe to track down the vehicle and promises to split the money with her.

If this sounds like the setup for a standard crime thriller, that’s because it is. And when the film stays within those parameters it tends to work. There is absolutely nothing wrong with attempting to spice up a genre, but in some cases while doing so it comes across as trying too hard. Unfortunately, this is occasionally the case with Cold Comes the Night. It seems as if the film tries to separate itself from other crime thrillers by having one of its leads be damn-near blind (Cranston), but it only results in a gimmicky plot device. A couple other questionable choices were made such as needlessly showing the end of the film at the beginning.

Appearing in one of his first roles since retiring from one of the greatest shows in television (Breaking Bad), Cranston returns to a character here that is not completely different from Walter White. Specifically, he is a cold-hearted killer on a mission to accumulate money and just so happens to do some good deeds along the way. The major differences between his characters are his fake Russian accent and his inability to see clearly, which only enough make one wonder if these embellishments were simply done to distinguish him from the notorious character that he is most known for.

Cold Comes the Night is a B-movie by its very definition—a lower budgeted film with little publicity or intention to reach the widest of audiences—and the film works best when it stays inside the confines of the genre, even if it becomes predictable and contrived while doing so. Cold Comes the Night succeeds in capturing the dark and eerie mood not through the tinted lenses of Cranston’s character, but from the rundown motel milieu. Unfortunately, the film becomes it own worst enemy.

Cold Comes the Night trailer