People today seem to be fascinated with dystopias. Think The Hunger Games and Divergent film franchises. In "Movies About Dystopias," we identified more than 30 examples of this popular genre and listed popular themes. These stories, usually set in the not-so-distant future, reflect our fears and the consequences of the excesses of contemporary societies: over-population, mechanized living, environmental destruction, violence and war, technology used to control and exploit people, health problems, persecution of individualists, and authoritarian rulers.

Things are not that bad yet in the contemporary setting of Tomorrowland, but the end-of-the-world as people know it is clearly on the way. Director Brad Bird previously revealed his take on the human condition with the animated film The Iron Giant (1999), an anti-guns parable about the friendship between a self-sacrificing robot and a boy who protects him. He maintains the same countercultural thrust in this film where he challenges us to empathize with three unconventional rebels in a time where there is little hope for the future of the human race.

It wasn't always this way. When Frank Walker (George Clooney) was a boy (Thomas Robinson), the future was anticipated as a time of possibility, great inventions, and adventures. At the 1964 World's Fair in New York, young Frank enters his invention of a jet pack for flying in a contest for things that will make the world a better place. The judge, Nix (Hugh Laurie), is not impressed, but a mysterious girl named Athena (Raffey Cassidy) encourages him. She gives him a pin that enables him to enter another dimension, known as Tomorrowland.

Years later in Cape Canaveral, high school student Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) listens in class to dire facts about the inevitability of world war, environment destruction, extreme weather, and more. But all she wants to know is "Can we fix it?"

Two wolves are fighting. One wolf represents darkness and despair. The other lightness and hope. Which one will win? The one you feed.

Casey is an optimist and believes that even small actions can change the world. She's been trying to sabotage the tearing down of a space platform where her father (Tim McGraw), a NASA engineer, works. Arrested for trespassing, she spends the night in jail. Among her things when she is released is a pin that takes her to Tomorrowland.

Although her visit to the exciting world of the future is short, it changes her life, and she sets out to find out how to get back there. On her quest, she meets Athena, who turns out to be a robot charged with the mission of finding "dreamers." She takes Casey to Frank Walker's house. He's now jaded and disillusioned and convinced that the world is ending in a matter of days. But like Athena he recognizes a spark of something special in Casey. She hasn't given up yet, and soon the three of them are on their way to Tomorrowland to see if they can change the future.

They have a formidable adversary in Nix, the authoritarian leader of Tomorrowland and his army of robots. He is absolutely certain that the way to get people to change is to bombard them with predictions of the world's collapse. In a passionate speech, he describes many characteristics of our world today where people are consumed by greed and prone to constant distractions. Can he scare people straight or is his mindset creating a self-fulfilling prophecy?

Tomorrowland asks a central spiritual question: What is needed for the great work of tikkun — repairing the world? And to what extent are our beliefs creating our experiences?

At the heart and soul of the film is a bold affirmation of imagination as the spiritual force that can save civilization. Here the optimistic girl, the robot who is able to override her programming, and the boy-genius turned adult inventor discover that the way to avert the impending disaster requires both a change of heart and a change of mind. They want others, especially young people, to join them, starting with the belief that transformation is possible.

"We are looking for dreamers, anyone who will feed the right wolf, the ones who haven't given up."