Guy Lodge Film Critic A lacquered Czech period piece with surprisingly topical interests at its core, “We Have Never Been Modern” rather ambitiously borrows its title from a key text by the late French philosopher Bruno Latour — in which he argued that humanity’s distinction between nature and our own culture is a wholly modern development, and one we’d do best to move away from. While Latour’s ideas can indeed be mapped onto a story that charts modern society’s fixation on human advancement against its rejection of human difference, Matěj Chlupáček’s gripping, gleamingly produced second feature isn’t as academic as all that: Ultimately a humane message movie planting flags for both women’s liberation and queer rights, this Karlovy Vary competition premiere could easily resonate with festival and arthouse audiences away from home turf.