Writer-director Gary Wallow’s micro-budget sci-fi Lars Shrike Walks the Night looks like it could’ve been made in the 1990s, and that’s a compliment. It’s unpolished, dirty, rugged, just like its hapless protagonist. Underneath all the layers of grit lies a warm, beating heart.

Lars (Kelsey Grammer), who wakes up on what seems to be a distant planet with amnesia, states his mission early on, the only thing he seems to remember. “There’s a power grid on the meridian. If I can get there, this can beam me off,” he says, referring to his weapon, a gun called a chronoblaster. The only company he has is his unreliable built-in AI system. He fends off an alien flying pufferfish (a “turdfish bird”). He also hears himself narrate the story. Yep, it’s that kind of movie: self-aware, very meta, with a healthy dose of artistic merit and a dash of pretentiousness.

Lars soon meets Lottie (Christine Lin), who seems to be another escapee. Is she a figment of his imagination? He stumbles upon more characters — dressed like folks from Earth, with a tent and a truck (“A four-wheeled device”). He then discovers a house, a homeless person getting water from a hose, a boy playing video games, a cop, and more. Eventually, Lars unshackles himself. After seeing a California license plate, he wonders if he’s on Earth or if it’s an illusion and he’s being filmed. He uses a computer at a library to track down an address — one Richard Kindred (David Clennon), whose identity I’ll leave undisclosed.

“…he wonders if he’s on Earth or if it’s an illusion and he’s being filmed…”

Moments of wit punctuate our hero’s desperate, parched journey. Lars calls soft drink cans “drinking cylinders”, tries to plug his chronoblaster into an electrical socket to charge it, and asks if a cellphone is a tracking device (“Yeah, it can track you,” comes the honest reply). Influences ranging from Alejandro Jodorowsky to David Lynch are apparent. The film proudly wears its shoestring budget, with grainy cinematography courtesy of J. Connor Bjornson, old-school VFX, and saturated colors. Shot in the California desert, it utilizes the location well, making it even more uncanny than it already is.

The narrative may prove a tad slow-moving for some, but it’s anchored by Grammer, who carries the film, guided by his own narration. Disheveled, torn up, contemplative, determined, frightened — you’ve never seen Grammer like this before. He makes us see Earth through his eyes: alien, mysterious, fascinating. The man single-handedly carries the film — no easy task, but one that he’s more than up to.

For a film with a small budget and scope, the themes are existential, vast, sprawling. Lars Shrike Walks the Night is about being an outcast, survival, loneliness, and hope. One could make the claim that it’s a sci-fi-tinged allegory about homelessness, or a statement about the power of storytelling, or an ode to creativity and being free. Everything is both soaked with apocalyptic dread and a sense of ceaseless wonder. Go ahead and delve into the night. You’re bound to find some curious things there.