“AJ Goes to the Dog Park” is a cheerfully cheesy semi-surreal indie film about what one dopey chihuahua owner will go through to get his dog park back.

It’s twee in the extreme, with the occasional sophisticated effect — “No need to cry CG tears!” — and a lot of DIY ones. There are stuffed dogs double for the “real” ones, a windblown inflata-guy meant to be the “hero” getting blasted by a prairie breeze in the screwball Fargo (lots of models of the city) to go with inside joke “landmarks” and a pirate on an across-the-state-line-from-North Dakota Minnesoooooota lake.

This is a goofy version of the Fargo the locals know, a Fargo of their mind — not the Coen Brothers’ minds. And that Fargo has its charms.

AJ (AJ Thompson) is a cubicle drone perfectly content to keep his entry level tech job and not accept a promotion from the boss. As the boss is his dad (Greg Carlson) who’d like to prep the lad into taking over the family business, you’d think that’d be a problem. But not for AJ.

He’s got dinners with dad and “Stewp” (“Soup that’s a stew,” donchaknow) with his married pals (Morgan Hoyt Davy and Danny Davy) and his dogs, Biff and Diddy. And best of all, he’s got a dog part to take them to.

“AJ Goes to the Dog Park” is about what happens to AJ’s contentment when a moronic mayor (Crystal Cossette Park) converts the Dog Park to a Blog Park, “no dogs allowed.”

AJ’s life unravels, and he must challenge the mayor via the tenets of “ancient Fargo law” to unseat her and get his park back.

He must catch a bigger muskie than the mayor ever did. A Minnesotan (Jacob Hartje) turned small craft warning in a pirate hat will be his “Yarrrrrr” coach.

AJ must be tougher than the mayor, learning to wrestle from the coach turned hazelnut tycoon (Jason Ehlert) who moved into Morgan and Danny’s house when they fled North Dakota.

And he must evade the mayor’s Fargoans in Black, two goons in black suits and Raybans who would do anything to save the mayor’s job — anything.

Writer-director Toby Jones, with other directors filming the sometimes animated flashbacks that most every character trots out at some point, melds sketch comedy, comic book and student film style visuals and shtick for laughs, occasionally letting some of the infamous quirkiness of the Northern Plains in on the joke.

“Need I say much more?”

AJ misquotes the Bible, gets ticketed for waving while bicycling and learns to tap/sap trees as he loses track of the forest, the park and those two dogs for those trees.

What all involved have committed to — the film looks like a summer shoot, with a call-back for a taste of Fargo’s winters — and conjured up is a classic “film festival film,” a movie too twee, precious and amateurish to live outside of North America’s film fest circuit. Film buffs at such events tend to cut a lot of slack to plucky little comedies with no budgets and non-professional casts. Groupthink sets in as unassuming little comedies like this offer a contrast to the much more polished film fare on display — foreign and art films.

There are about 30 minutes worth of fresh (ish) ideas and about ten chuckles in “Dog Park.” Like many a festival film before it, the cold hard truth about “Dog Park” is it can’t thrive on charm alone, not without more laughs.

At least the guy playing the pirate seemed to be having a grand time of it.

Rating: unrated, mock violence, a moment of profanity

Cast: AJ Thompson, Crystal Cossette Knight, Greg Carlson, Morgan Hoyt Davy, Danny Davy and Jacob Hartje

Credits: Scripted and directed by Toby Jones. A Doppelgänger release.

Running time: 1:19