The Oscar winner, who was a chemist at coffee company Maxwell House before becoming an actor, will host events for directors to meet scientists in an effort to “get it right”, The Australian reports.

He’s the face of new lobby group the Science and Entertainment Exchange, which is an initiative of the National Academy of Sciences.

Members of the group will promote films deemed to respect scientific principles, such as Jurrassic Park, which explained DNA, and debunk those which are unrealistic such as The Core, about flying to the centre of the earth to get the planet spinning again.

“Dustin thinks you can make entertaining movies which also get a message across without slowing down the action,” a source said.

“He enjoys comic book blockbusters but if they go over the top and don’t care about getting it right, why should the audience care?”

In a poll of hundreds of scientists about bad sci-fi films The Core was voted the worst.

But some also feared Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth damaged the environmental cause by exaggerating certain issues.

Physics professor Sidney Perkowitz said blockbuster The Day After Tomorrow may have done more good than Gore’s film.

The Day After Tomorrow “also exaggerated the speed of environmental catastrophe but not only did more people see it – they also thought about it”, Perkowitz said.

“Films should, above all, be entertaining.”