Fans of David Lynch know to expect little from direct questioning of the gentleman from Missoula, Mont. The filmmaker is famously sensitive about preserving the mysteries in his films, and new endeavors are typically described in broad terms (for a long time, “Inland Empire” was “about a woman in trouble”). The foreword to “Lynch on Lynch,” a thorough, film-by-film volume of interviews, quotes the writer and director joking about checking into a “rape-crisis center” after the process.

In his caution, Mr. Lynch is simply being faithful to his dreamlike movies, which are best left experienced as raw as one’s own nightmares. It’s therefore hard to know whether “Lynch,” a documentary about the filmmaker that opens Friday at the IFC Center, could be anything but frustrating despite having “virtually unlimited access.” But, working through observation rather than interrogation, the film carves out a very modest, personal feel for a sweet, somewhat delicate man.

Shot before and during the making of Mr. Lynch’s 2006 head-trip “Inland Empire,” “Lynch” tags along with its subject exclusively at work in his Los Angeles studio and on set (mostly in Poland, though the film is as hands-off about orienting the viewer as is Mr. Lynch). Semi-candid moments and weird back-porch stories gradually yield to more standard making-of glimpses. We also see Mr. Lynch, who trained in painting and sculpture, dabbing at and attaching beastly things to canvases. (The more traditional 1997 documentary, “Pretty as a Picture: The Art of David Lynch,” though it focuses on the making of “Lost Highway,” explores Mr. Lynch’s mixed-media interests at greater length.)

Mr. Lynch’s nasal voice and geewhiz expressions can sound like a put-on to the uninitiated, but “Lynch” reminds us that there’s a sensitive individual behind all the nightmares. Sitting in a car wondering aloud about his newest endeavor, he pronounces himself “ready for anything” and then, a beat later, “so depressed.” After one of the one-sided phone calls we observe in his office, Mr. Lynch is morose over some dereliction by the unidentified caller (possibly a producer or artistic collaborator, though it’s unclear).

But far from fitting the stereotype of a tormented artist, “Lynch” testifies to the role of bliss in its subject’s creative process. As the 61-year-old filmmaker insisted last year while promoting his book “Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity,” transcendental meditation has provided the serene canvas for his unsettling imagination for more than 35 years now. This is familiar territory to fans, but somehow it still doesn’t fail to amaze that the hellacious sadist Frank Booth from “Blue Velvet” could emerge from an ocean of peace.

Isolating the chimera of inspiration is never really satisfying, though, and “Lynch” holds more interest for the primary footage of the artist shepherding his actors or feeling out an abandoned factory for a location (where he catches a vibe from how electricity enters and leaves the area). This is bliss in another sense: Mr. Lynch is boyishly charming and skilled at putting his actors at ease, from Laura Dern to assorted bit actors like a stage-struck homeless woman whom he recruited for the harrowing Hollywood Boulevard scene in “Inland Empire.”

Shot in digital video, “Lynch” sometimes casts its subject in an unnecessarily enigmatic light through cropped framing and little explanation. Sure, seeing Mr. Lynch slop green paint over every inch of a sports jacket is evocative, but “Lynch” is too enamored with feebly mimicking the director’s unsettling style without illuminating his techniques. Interjected black-and-white footage of grainy, blurred countryside feels superfluous for a director whose work already conjures a surplus of mood.

It’s hard to point a finger over these concerns. In fact, it’s basically impossible: The direction of “Lynch” is credited to the pseudonym “blackANDwhite.” The enervating gesture of secrecy, together with the almost Lettermanesque footage of Mr. Lynch delivering the daily weather report that he posts on his Web site, nudges the documentary into the realm of the one-man cult of fandom that supports the subscription-based site.

Catering to a wider audience might have forced Mr. blackANDwhite into focusing the goals and broadening the ambitions of this documentary. (The mystery filmmaker, incidentally, will presumably reveal his or her identity during appearances at two screenings at the IFC Center Friday.) As is, the achievement of “Lynch” is circumscribed by its fly-on-the-wall approach and a subject who is perhaps most direct when drilling holes into our psyches with his movies.

Through October 30 (323 Sixth Ave. at West 3rd Street, 212-924-7771).