Joel Potrykus’s new movie, “Vulcanizadora,” was filmed in the backwoods of Michigan and the seamier precincts of Grand Rapids. A native of the Wolverine State, Mr. Potrykus keeps his doings close to home, both as a measure of artistic independence and a means of saving a buck: Michigan doesn’t require much in the way of bureaucratic hoop-jumping for filmmakers to pursue their art. “Permits, or even permission in general, insurance, lawyers,” Mr. Potrykus avers, “these are things we don’t have to think about while filming.”

This goes some way in explaining the grubby, do-it-yourself character of “Vulcanizadora.” That, and a budget so meager that Mr. Potrykus’s picture didn’t qualify for what are, apparently, generous tax incentives offered by the state. The auteur keeps things local and in the family: The Potrykus name pops up regularly in the movie’s closing credits. For all of this, he’s been hailed as “indie cinema’s patron saint of misfits.”

“Vulcanizadora” is Mr. Potrykus’s fifth film, the previous four having likely flown under the radar of polite moviegoers, including this one. All the same, he’s carved a public profile of some stature. His feature debut, “Ape” (2012), earned a Best New Director notice at the prestigious Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland, and Mr. Potrykus has been written about in favorable terms by the New York Times and the New Yorker. He’s even taken a meeting or two in Hollywood — imagine that.

The inventor of “metal slackerdom” has garnered a fan base that is fairly selective and is possessed of a vision that seems constitutionally incapable of catering to general tastes. “Vulcanizadora” is not easy to recommend, though it is singular, so much so that it can’t help but prompt curiosity about his other pictures. Although often annoying in its cinematic tics — Mr. Potrykus isn’t beyond arty or superfluous flourishes — “Vulcanizadora” is a tale whose changeable tone feeds into a serious inquiry about the nature and responsibilities of adulthood.

The film’s level of seriousness will elude viewers in the early stretches. Having recently written in these pages about the comedy duo Cheech and Chong, I was reminded of their shambling aesthetic and liberal use of the word “man” as a conversational emphasis by the two leads of “Vulcanizadora,” Derek Skiba (Mr. Potrykus) and Martin Jakitansky (Joshua Burge). Derek is trifling, hyper, anxious, and talkative; Martin is noncommittal, mum, and burdened by a nameless dread. There’s little to no camaraderie between the two men, though they are, ostensibly, friends.

We meet Martin and Derek as they hike through the forest on a mission whose parameters are ambiguous. What they carry in their backpacks betokens a woeful sense of preparation: a camera, a tripod, Gatorade, a package of Little Debbie snack cakes, the stray firework, and some-or-other jerry-rigged mechanical device. As director and screenwriter, Mr. Potrykus drops hints about his leads that eventually snowball into legible traits: Derek is separated from his young son, Martin has been charged with a crime. But what is the nature of their trek?

A dark-hearted comedy infiltrates the first half of “Vulcanizadora,” the majority of which is generated by Derek’s adolescent fancies and motor-mouth ramblings. He’s an exasperating character, this boy-man. However bothersome his behavior, Derek emerges as a sympathetic oddball whose exaggerations hide a world of hurt. 

Martin is harder to get a peg on. He’s stoic and grim — imagine a brooding amalgamation of Buster Keaton, Ratso Rizzo, and Doestoevsky’s Raskolnikov. Why, we wonder, does Martin keep insisting on his guilt, and what is it that he is guilty of?

Any further elaboration on the plot will thwart its dramatic impact. Suffice it to say, it ain’t pretty. What begins as a two-hander by way of Samuel Beckett and Herschell Gordon Lewis turns into a frustrating exercise in one person’s attempt to do right — for his friends, his family, those he has wronged, and, last on the list, himself. Is it too much to claim this off-kilter cut-rate movie as biblical in its leanings? Perhaps not.

Mr. Potrykus is aided immeasurably in this enterprise by a long-time collaborator, Mr. Burge, who pulls us through the back-half of “Vulcanizadora” with an increasing sense of his character’s vulnerability and motivation. The narrative ends on a fuzzy note that, against significant odds, betokens something approaching hope. It’s wise to be cautious of filmmakers who flaunt their own idiosyncrasies, but Mr. Potrykus is a talent whose movies bear reckoning with.