“Together, the two actresses create a portrait of intimacy so convincing that it transcends performance.”

Coincidences often change the course of a life. Cato Kusters’ film Julian begins deceptively small: Fleur (Nina Meurisse), running late to a concert, brushes past Julian (Laurence Roothooft) to reach her seat. That fleeting encounter is enough for the two women to catch each other’s gaze, and from that instant they fall into a love that will shape their lives, but also a project that transcends borders.

Their early conversations turn to marriage. The women have family ties in Greece and Italy, yet in 2017 neither country legally recognized same-sex marriage (and Italy still does not today). Fleur, discontented that only 22 countries worldwide allowed marriage equality at the time, imagines a different world that not only celebrates those 22, but she imagines what it would mean if all 196-plus nations recognized such unions. What begins as a dream becomes a mission. Fleur and Julian will marry in every country where it is legal; not only as a personal testament of their love, but also as an act of political defiance.

Fleur is a journalist, though her boss has little enthusiasm for the idea. Yet Fleur insists on its necessity. While it might be powerful to interview the first gay couples married in each country, what she and Julian are attempting instead shows the power of love and equal rights while confronting the silence of countries where equality remains a distant dream. This “marriage project” is both protest and proof; it’s an insistence that love is not conditional, that gay lives deserve recognition across the globe.

Kusters stages this with a varied formal approach, alternating present-day clarity with grainy camcorder footage meant to stand in for past events. At first the device feels puzzling, but as Julian’s health begins to fail and illness overtakes her, the choice gains poignancy. These fragments become haunted memories, glimpses of moments that can no longer be recovered. Yet Kusters does not always rely on this format, sometimes choosing more conventional images of the past, and that inconsistency lends the film a lingering air of mystery about memory, testimony, and how we represent love once it slips away.

The heart of Julian lies in its performances. Nina Meurisse is radiant, carrying both the intellectual strength of Fleur’s convictions and the raw emotional weight of her grief. In a scene where she receives Julian’s diagnosis, her anguish is palpable and her pain reverberates beyond the screen. Laurence Roothooft, meanwhile, delivers a performance of startling naturalism. Her smile, open and unguarded, conveys a love that feels profoundly organic, anchoring the film in authenticity. Together, the two actresses create a portrait of intimacy so convincing that it transcends performance. In any just world, both would be getting accolades and recognition at the end of the year, from outlets like the Oscars and the Cesars. But just like with any rights, fairness and justice often don’t exist.

The film also dares to ask: why does this still matter today? In one exchange Fleur asks, “Are we a national threat?” to which Julian replies, “That’s how the world works.” Since the couple’s project began, more countries have recognized same-sex marriage – 38 as of this year. And yet, the sense of progress remains fragile. Across the world, gay rights face renewed attack. Even in supposedly secure Western democracies, politicians and cultural movements suggest rolling back protections, or at least reintroducing an atmosphere of suspicion and hostility. Italy, strikingly, still refuses to legalize same-sex marriage, and is one of countless countries where it would be assumed gay marriage would exist.

When I was young, I had many thoughts that I would never be able to marry a man or even to have a true out relationship. I was afraid to ever tell any of my family of my sexuality. The character of Julian represents these feelings; she makes this tension personal. Julian, estranged from her own family, never expected to marry and never expected to be able to marry. The cruel irony is that just as marriage equality expands, just as she embraces her right to love openly, illness strips away her chance to live it fully. This absence lingers over the film and gives the film its power – because for other gay people who may doubt that life can contain both love and visibility, Fleur and Julian’s project becomes a testament: proof that equality is possible, and that love itself can be a form of resistance.

For Kusters, this makes Julian not simply a film about rights, but about presence. About insisting, again and again, that gay and queer people are humans, that we have the same intimacy, devotion, and feelings as any heterosexual couple. Our stories deserve to be told and for this Julian is a testament that should be cherished and shared.