“The Paragon” is one of those indie film festival darlings that seems to come out of nowhere, with its budget a big part of its legend.

Movies from “El Mariachi” and “Clerks” to “Slackers” “The Blair Witch Project” and “Tangerine” have found glory and distribution based on film fest buzz of the “Look at what they got out of $9, $22 or $25 thousand dollars!”

“Paragon” is sci-fi on the cheap, and being from New Zealand, leans more towards the twee charms of “Safety Not Guaranteed” than the doom and dread of the even cheaper “Primer.”

It’s a parable of the true cost of revenge and the great value of enlightenment. Managing that in a movie with no famous faces and no “names” in its cast is no mean feat, even if this comedy never quite comes off.

“Paragon’s” laughs are mainly light chuckles, its action another variation on “good” supernaturalists fending off “evil” ones. And its best special effect may be a 1970 Lincoln Continental which our anti-hero’s psychic “coach” can drive from the back seat when everyone knows the steering wheel’s in the front.

Dutch, played by Benedict Wall (New Zealand’s Will Forte?), is a once 347th ranked tennis pro who loses his “Knife Fight Tennis” coaching business, his bored wife Emily (Jessica Grace Smith) and his house when he becomes the victim of a hit and-run.

“The end of me and tennis” has him morose, on crutches, living in his half-brother’s (Shadon Meredith) travel trailer and lusting for “revenge.”

The cops aren’t interested in looking for that one particular silver Toyota Corolla in Auckland. He’s fuming and lost until he sees the flier with phone-numbers dangling below, one of which he tears off.

“Do you want to see the Unseen?” it asks. Dutch does. He wants to find that Corolla and its driver and punish both for what they’ve done to him.

Calling the number from a pay phone, he’s not nearly impressed enough by the fact that the woman answering it knows his name and sends him to an empty gym on the other side of town “for answers.”

His cynical goof of a brother insists its a scam, because “people are running scams all the time. That’s basically how the economy works these days.” But Dutch goes, meets the cowled and mysterious Lyra (Florence Noble, the deadest deadpan since Buster Keaton) and submits to her extensive list of questions.

“How often do you masturbate?”

The woman with the giant “V” tattooed on her forehead is ready to turn the raging smart-aleck down when he pleads with her and they touch and she gets her clue that he might be ready to receive “psionic powers.”

“Have you ever been dead, Mr. Lawson?” Why, yes he has — after the accident — for six minutes.

The bulk of writer-director Michael Duignan’s film is one long lecture, training and psychic testing montage.

“Please take off your watch.” “Please stop smoking, drinking coffee and masturbating so much.” There’s a even “color diet” (“blue food, yellow food, red food” etc) to heighten Dutch’s reception of “The Protocol.”

Duignan, a veteran TV director (Down Under?) has our hero learn “telelocating,” which will help him find that illusive Corolla. Dutch must learn about the “ten dimensions,” what to do if he gets “lost in a parallel universe,” and to be wary of Lyra’s evil brother Haxan (A “Blair Witch” joke?), given a sinister edge by Jonny Brugh.

Naturally, there’s a magic crystal that must be telelocated.

The structure of “The Paragon” is a tad cumbersome — with events visually forshadowed and Dutch occasionally breaking into third person voice-over narration. The joke of Dutch looking for and being given “shortcuts” to enlightenment amuses. A bit.

And as with much Kiwi comedy, slightness of it all won’t tickle everybody. But after feeling offhand, glib and flaky for much of its length, it shows a little heart as we circle around the “revenge” that is a long time coming.

The performances are daft enough to land, and the audacity of it all counts for something.

If “The Paragon” isn’t the paragon of indie cinema frugality (“Tangerine,” shot on a cell phone, owns that title), it is a great example of how the conceit and the script will always be more important than the “stars” you attract to your debut feature.

Rating: unrated, profanity

Cast: Benedict Wall, Florence Noble, Jessica Grace Smith, Shadon Meredith and Jonny Brugh

Credits: Scripted and directed by Michael Duignan. A Music Box release.

Running time: 1:25