Sestero plays Jon, a homeless veteran in L.A. with nothing but a bloody t-shirt and a bag of lemons to his name. Virtually catatonic except for his sparkling blue eyes, Jon is awakened by the kindness of Harvey, an eccentric mortician (Tommy Wiseau, obviously) who gives him a job. Harvey’s hermetic mortuary is filled with odd keepsakes like nude mannequins and James Franco headshots (ha) but his most macabre trinkets are boxes of gold teeth taken from dead bodies. Jon is not the first noir hero to be undone by greed; he betrays his new friend to sell the dental gold on the black market. When he guiltily invites Harvey in on his plans, things spiral into paranoid uncertainty.

Best F(r)iends skips across genres; it’s a crime caper with moments of chilling horror and black humor, and it’s as uneasy as it is engrossing. Greg Sestero’s performance is stiffer than in his endearing reading of The Disaster Artist audiobook, though Jon is a much more guarded, closed-off character. The story shows surprising sophistication and challenges the audience’s sympathies. We’re initially aghast that Jon would betray his only friend, but as Jon grows remorseful, there are hints that Harvey may be something more sinister than the local kook. (“Can you really trust anyone?” I thought, The Room’s DVD cover branded onto my brain.) As our allegiances shift, the film becomes harder to pin down.

It’s startling to see Wiseau here, fifteen years after he presented himself as the gristly ideal of All-American masculinity in The Room; he’s older, yes, but also seems much smaller (even on towering platform shoes) and more vulnerable. In a long, black vinyl coat that makes him look like Hans Moleman in Undertaker cosplay, we glimpse the character actor Wiseau might have been if not for his obsessive quest to become a romantic leading man in the mold of James Dean.