It probably wasn’t on New Zealand journalist and filmmaker David Farrier’s mind as he tumbled into a story about narcississtic Kiwi name-caller, pathological liar and “in his own reality” con man named “Mister Organ” that he might have an American political allegory on his hands.

All that’s lacking in the film is a board certified diagnostician weighing in and saying “narcissistic peronsality disorder” to make the Michael Organ/Donald Trump comparison complete.

Farrier, a dogged reporter/filmmaker — remember “Tickled?”— spent years digging into the life of and getting to know and exposing Mister Organ.  He paid a legal and personal price as he and by extension the audience for this film discover just how ill-equipped society, human nature and the justice system are to deal with a relentlessly harassing gaslighter who simply repeats lies, ad nauseum, until most of us grow deaf to them and the most gullible among us — sometimes, even in court — actually believe the “art” this toxic BS artist is shoveling.

It begins with a bit of small business extortion. An antiques store in tony Ponsonby, Auckland, New Zealand is enforcing its “no parking in our parking lot” policy with a self-appointed “clamper” locking drivers’ wheels until they pay hundreds of dollars to get the clamp taken off.

The imperious owner of Bashford Antiques, Jillian Bashford, claims not to know who’s doing this on her behalf. Merely asking her about it, reporting or even complaining about it often results in threatening calls or letters from a “lawyer” named Michael Organ. Or “Organe,” or any number of other aliases trotted out by the guy over the years.

New Zealand, being a tiny country, makes it easy to figure out who this fellow is. He’s been in the papers, on talk radio. an ex-con who once stole a sailboat out of revenge against a creditor, a poseur who tried to pass himself as a “count” in myriad legal proceedings over the years. And he’s living with Mrs. Bashford, who is 30 years his senior.

“I’ve checked his legal qualifications,” a puzzled Farrier notes. “He doesn’t have any.“

Down the rabbit hole Farrier goes, speaking with a convicted “terrorist” and a long string of acquaintances who describes themselves as “victims” of Organ. The deeper Farrier digs into the guy, the more he comes into contact with him. He eventually finds himself talked-over and shouted-down in court by this classic “stupid person’s idea of what a smart person sounds like,” the posh-drawled Organ. And then they really get to know each other, after years (we gather) of run-on phone chats, interviews and lies endlessly-repeated so that Organ really gets into Farrier’s head.

At one point, the filmmaker is choking back tears at this “pointless exercise” with an “impossible” man with “more money than me,” who is just “better than me” at burying objective truth and “never letting something go.”

But there’s a “never let something go” relentlessness to Farrier, too. He stays engaged with this liar he loathes, this smug, repellent bully, first trying to let him trip himself up with his web of deceit, and when that doesn’t phase the toxic creep, actively confronting him with those lies, the proven court case and jail time, and other contradictions.

Perhaps Farrier should be hosting “Meet the Press.” You don’t see this kind of push-back on American political TV.

Farrier’s frustrations spill off the screen and give the viewer the same anxiety the reporter feels, the same anxiety anyone shares who knows something about facing down a lying, harassing, bullying moron who won’t leave you be.

The quirky Kiwis depicted here aren’t amusing in that Taika/Jemaine way, just well-mannered eccentrics (and enablers, including Organ’s family) baffled by what to do about such a dangerous manipulator, how to deal with him and what they’ll do to escape his clutches.

Farrier leaves a lot unsaid in the film. He doesn’t look into Organ’s childhood — what made him this way — has no mental health experts on camera, and doesn’t get too deep into Organ’s possibly predatory (certainly overbearing) relationship with his Sugar Mama, Bashford.

But Farrier’s made a fascinating picture to ponder about how difficult it is to challenge a system and its gullible pawns who enable such predators to get away with all that they do, simply by talking, bluffing and buffaloing their lies into the conversation, fooling just enough of the people and scaring others and forcing everybody else to deal with their “reality,” no matter how unrelated to real “reality” it is.

Rating: unrated, profanity

Cast: Michael Organ, David Farrier and Jillian Bashford, many others

Credits: Directed and scripted by David Farrier. A Drafthouse Films release.

Running time: 1:35