Hugo Weaving has called on young people to go on strike for the future of a planet shaken by “nationalistic fervour”.
The actor stars in upcoming ecological epic Mortal Engines, set in a world driven by a relentless battle for resources between warring city states.
Insular and hierarchical states, like fully mobile fictional London, engage in a Darwinian struggle to survive after a cataclysmic event has swept the planet and left a resistance movement of young people seeking change.
Weaving sees parallels between the dystopian environment of Mortal Engines, and the political and ecological battles being waged in the real world.
He has urged young people to do their bit to change a world whose potential problems are reflected in the film.
Weaving said: “It’s about cycles in history, the way things come round again and again and again. The environment has been destroyed, and the city states are pulling up their drawbridges, and waving their own flags.
“There’s a lot of patriotic, nationalistic fervour which is very apparent in the world today.
“I think if you’re in a world where people are fearful, and if you’re making a film in that world, it has to reflect the world you’re in, it has to.
“The young characters are the ones who have a sense that they have to do something about the world in which they live. Kids, go on strike. Strike for the environment.”
Weaving, who has appeared in dystopian sci-fi series The Matrix, plays Thaddeus Valentine in the upcoming film by the creator of Lord Of The Rings.