First love, by definition, is only truly experienced by the two people caught up in it: the unspoken words, the private jokes, the glances, the sense of being alone together in the world. Drake Doremus' "Like Crazy" tries to pull us, the audience, into that private world with Jacob (Anton Yelchin) and Anna (Felicity Jones), two nice young people who fall in love as college students and must endure an emotional separation as she returns to her native England. While the film is often quite moving, it's also at times frustrating; people in love, we realize, aren't always as fascinating to the rest of us as they are to each other.

Filmed with handheld intimacy, "Like Crazy" follows the trajectory of Jacob and Anna's romance, beginning with their meet-cute (she leaves a note on his car windshield, after spotting him in class). They quickly learn that they have much in common — they're both only children who love Paul Simon's "Graceland" album — and soon we're watching a windswept, romantic montage on the California beach, with bare feet touching each other. They fall in love, body and soul, and Anna, caught up in the passion of the moment, decides not to go home when her student visa expires. This is a mistake — the kind of mistake made by very young, moonstruck people who aren't thinking about tomorrow — and for much of the rest of the film they are separated by continents, trying to maintain their relationship via telephone and texting.

Yelchin (best known for playing Chekhov in 2009's "Star Trek") and Jones (Miranda in Julie Taymor's "The Tempest") are both attractive, charming performers, and it's always achingly believable that these two are in love. But you wish the screenplay (by Doremus with Ben York Jones) gave them dialogue that wasn't quite so generic. It's understandable — people in love, and out of love, have always said the same things to each other — but you keep waiting for these characters to say something truly interesting, and they don't. (The always wonderful Jennifer Lawrence, of "Winter's Bone," lurks nearby, threatening to steal the movie as a sweet co-worker to whom Jacob is attracted.)

Ultimately, "Like Crazy" works as a story of youth, and as a rueful reminder of how, in very early adulthood, love can be a work in progress.

"I don't feel very young," says Anna at her office, believing it with all her heart.

"Well, you are," says her boss, knowingly.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com