Emma Thompson thinks we need a body image “revolution”.

The 63-year-old actress starred as retired teacher and widower Nancy Stokes who hires sex worker Leo Grande - played by Daryl McCormack - to help her achieve her first ever orgasm in her recent film 'Good Luck To You, Leo Grande'.

In the movie, Emma has to appear naked in some scenes and film lovemaking sequences and it has made her rethink her attitude to her own body.

Emma confessed there has not been a “day since she was 14” that she has not remarked to herself she is “too fat” and she insists in 2022 it is time to ditch these negative body hang-ups.

Appearing on SiriusXM’s ‘The Jess Cagle Podcast with Julia Cunningham’, she said: "I present as a great deal more self accepting than I actually am, so it's quite good to acknowledge that and say there hasn't been a day since I was 14 when I haven't thought I'm too fat. Not a day. I've actually thought that I've actually, seriously and I think that a lot of people will hear that and go ‘Well, I feel that’. I've thought that absolutely.

“These are very important things to talk about because actually we really do need a revolution about this stuff because, yes with me, it’s not so serious because I have a lot of meaning and purpose in my life that helps me overcome that kind of brainwashing but a lot of people don’t have that or they have opportunities. And what they end up with is mental health issues. I mean, this is actually a public health issue. And even though I don't want to attach that to the movie, but that's really the disorder discussion that comes up around it is incredibly healthy and healing I find and it's helped me an awful lot.”

Emma - who has been married to actor Greg Wise since 2003 - believes that self-acceptance is absolutely essential for humans because if we hate ourselves how can we expect anyone else to love us.

She said: “We need to find a way of accepting ourselves at the very least that's the least we can do. Because if we can't accept ourselves, then who else is going to? And how can we experience pleasure?”