GARDINER, N.Y. — Even after he bought his 78-acre property here, expanded it and turned it into a veritable Bobbywood, Robert De Niro never made much of an impression on this town of 5,800 farmers, climbers, laborers and second-home owners.

Mr. De Niro rarely passes through but for the occasional ice cream cone with his younger children, local residents say, and the only way people even know he is here is when a helicopter comes buzzing up the Wallkill River, landing on his ample fields where apples once grew.

“He’s the ghost of Gardiner,” John Habersberger, a local gadfly, said while standing on the two-block Main Street last week.

Mr. De Niro’s message to his neighbors in this Ulster County town 75 miles north of Manhattan could have been delivered by one of his menacing characters: Don’t bother me, I won’t bother you.