REAL EMOTION LIFTS ROMANCE.

Byline: Glenn Whipp Film Critic

DAVID GORDON Green's ``All the Real Girls'' is a love story for dorks, and I mean that in the best possible way. After all, hasn't love made each of us a helpless, mumbling goofball at one time or another in our lives? Well, finally somebody made a movie about all those heightened emotions and wounded sensibilities, and not only made it, but also got every note right, right down to the smallest stutter, shyest glance and stupidest mistake.

Green, who wrote and directed the movie, is just 27, but on the strength of this film and his lyrical 2000 debut, ``George Washington,'' it's safe to say that he has become an important and distinctive voice in American cinema. ``Real Girls'' earned a special award at this year's Sundance Film Festival for ``emotional truth,'' which sounds kind of hokey, but it perfectly sums up the vibe coming from Green's films. There is a fine line being negotiated here between heart-rending honesty and preciousness, but Green usually manages to stay on the right side, creating something believable that possesses an almost unbelievable feeling.

With ``Real Girls,'' he opens with Paul (Paul Schneider) and Noel (Zooey Deschanel) about to enjoy their first kiss. The scene lasts for several minutes, the two actors inching closer to each other in a wide frame, characters we're only now just meeting, and, boy, it's a beautiful introduction for what is to come.

Up until now, Paul has been an unrepentant skirt-chaser, known in his small, North Carolina mill town as a good-for-nothing jerk with little focus or ambition. (Green shot an entire first act outlining this before discarding most of the footage; the outtakes he uses as flashbacks provide rich background.) Paul's mother (Patricia Clarkson) doesn't mince words, saying her son's ``not educated, honest or strong.''

But that was before he met Noel, who just happens to the 18-year-old kid sister of his drinking buddy, Tip (Shea Wigham). Tip understandably isn't thrilled about Paul taking up with his innocent sister, just back from boarding school. What Tip doesn't know is that Paul sees Noel as his redeemer, someone who will make him a better man.

Those are big shoes to fill, particularly for an 18-year-old looking to experience a little bit of what life and love have to offer. And that's the impetus for the monkey wrench Green throws into the relationship. But unlike other manufactured movie romances where the formula - boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back again - is ingrained, ``Real Girls'' digs deeper, sincerely and passionately exploring the insanity that is a natural by-product when one falls in love for the first time.

Meanwhile, lurking in the background are the walking wounded: Paul's lonely mom; his uncle (Benjamin Mouton), still coping with the loss of his wife; and, surprisingly, Tip himself, who isn't the hard case we pegged him for. They provide the chorus and Green and cinematographer Tim Orr supply the vivid atmosphere that wraps the movie up in a dream state offering both rhapsody and despair. In other words: love.

ALL THE REAL GIRLS - Three and one half stars

(R: language, some sexuality)

Starring: Zooey Deschanel, Paul Schneider, Patricia Clarkson, Shea Wigham.

Director: David Gordon Green.

Running time: 1 hr. 48 min.

Playing: Laemmle's Town Center 5 in Encino; Laemmle's Playhouse 7 in Pasadena; Laemmle's Monica in Santa Monica; Laemmle's Sunset 5 in West Hollywood.

In a nutshell: A love story, true and beautiful.

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Paul Schneider embarks on the painful and tentative process of discovering true love with Zooey Deschanel in ``All the Real Girls.''