While others in the entertainment business have fearfully kept opinions to themselves, the Hollywood veteran received death threats for speaking out against Hillary Clinton in the last US presidential election and for opposing the Iraq War.

She stood at the picket line to protest the Dakota pipeline and has been vocal on her views on Harvey Weinstein and the #MeToo movement.

“What is worse is living with yourself if you have an opportunity to do things and you don’t,” Sarandon tells Saturday Extra in an interview at her Sydney hotel.

“The things that I regret are only things I didn’t say or do, even though I went through a pretty scary time leading up to Iraq, and I certainly — in not supporting Hillary Clinton — ended up getting an enormous amount of heat about that.

“But at the end of the day, you want to look back and the regrets that you have are the stand you didn’t take and at least I can say I tried. For me, maybe that is ego.

“I just know for all the unkind or hurtful things, or scary things that have happened because of an unpopular stand with the war or whatever, I don’t regret it.”

The actor, who won an Academy Award in 1995 for Dead Man Walking, continues: “The most harsh punishment is isolation from your tribe.

“So if you are standing up at the Academy Awards and you are talking about the Haitians that are in Guantanamo, and then you get kicked out of the Academy and when you leave no one will make eye contact with you and you become persona non grata within your tribe.

“Even if you have your life threatened, or hate jocks are saying terrible things and telling people to knock your teeth out or whatever, I never thought that would happen … the isolation that comes from your peers when that is going down, that is very hurtful.”

Sarandon is proud of her activism. She is a proud feminist and has raised her three now adult children to be the same. The 71-year-old is active on social media, mostly Twitter and Instagram, and often lends her voice to causes she feels passionate about.

“You just have to cling to and support the people that are standing with you,” she says when asked what got her through the toughest of times.

“That is why any time someone is in a situation where they take a stand and people turn against them, I always make sure I call. ”

Sarandon is talking with Saturday Extra ahead of judging duties at this year’s Tropfest Film Festival at Parramatta Park today.

She is the head judge, sitting alongside Rachel Griffiths, Garth Davis, Jennifer Peedom and Rob Collins, for the festival which was given a last-minute financial lifeline from sponsor CGU Insurance.

Each year the festival has a theme, with organisers this year calling for “culturally diverse” stories.

“Storytelling right now is really important and especially with this festival diversifying and hopefully telling stories where you’re encouraged to identify with people you normally wouldn’t identify with. Any kind of film that starts a dialogue, I am interested in,” she says.

“Artists have the responsib-ility to look from the outside and to report and to tell those stories that are being overlooked or being warped or being ignored.

“In my book, every film is political because it either reinforces the status quo — racism, ageism, sexism — or it challenges the status quo.”

As for Weinstein and the #MeToo movement, Sarandon commends women for coming forward with their stories.

She believes to move the conversation forward, society needs to look at the economic imbalance of power between men and women.

“The imbalance of power exists because of an economic imbalance for women in every industry,” she says. “It is juicier to look at the entertainment business but it is waitresses, it is nannies, it is every woman that has to keep her job that has someone abusing power at the top.

“To create safe work environments is a very important thing and that starts with discussion, it starts with making it clear there is zero tolerance and making it safe for women to come forward.

“I am raising sons that don’t feel entitled to take advantage of people, men or women, because of their powerful position. We have to start as mothers to make sure we are not only raising daughters that are strong, but raising sons who understand to be vulnerable themselves is a strength and that we need male feminists.

“That is very important, it is not a male-female thing, there are men that are vulnerable that are being abused. We need to protect everyone and make it not cool to be that guy or that person that takes advantage of their power.”

More broadly, Sarandon believes it is a great time of change for the film industry.

“The studios are kind of monoliths at this point and they haven’t all figured out even how to use the internet to sell films let alone how to reach people,” she says.

“A lot of young people or new filmmakers trying to navigate that and have their films heard are doing so almost by self-publishing. The last five films I’ve done have all been with women directors but none of them have been big budget. I am interested in doing challenging, really fun things and sometimes they are not great big enterprises that are committee decided …

“Moonlight was done for nothing. The Shape of Water was done for $19 million off grid also because (director Guillermo del Toro) wanted to maintain his authority.”

This year, Sarandon says she will continue to mix it up with big budget and smaller films. She has several film releases slated for this year and will begin work on the new series of acclaimed TV drama, Ray Donovan, in New York in April.

“I am so happy it is in New York. I love Liev (Schreiber) and I love being bad, so I am looking forward to that. It is so much fun being bad, so much more fun than being good.”