In Prophecies of Nostradamus, the world of 1999 is a decaying landscape pushed to the brink by centuries of human environmental neglect. The film portrays a planet suffering from industrial over-saturation, where the air is thick with radioactive smog and the natural order has completely unraveled. Earth is depicted as a dying organism where traditional seasons have vanished, replaced by erratic and lethal weather shifts that threaten the survival of all civilization.

The societal dynamics are defined by a desperate, failed attempt at ecological management. As pollutants seep into the water and soil, humanity experiences biological divergence: children develop strange telekinetic abilities, while those in radiation-heavy zones, such as New Guinea, degenerate into mutated cannibals. The global political structure collapses into panic, leading to mass suicides among the youth and ultimately a hair-trigger nuclear standoff as nations fight over dwindling, uncontaminated resources.

The film is noted for several eerie parallels to real-world events. Most notably, it depicts a devastating earthquake triggering a meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, a scenario that tragically manifested in 2011. It also accurately identified the emerging threat of ozone layer destruction and the resulting atmospheric heat, long before these became mainstream scientific concerns. While the specific 1999 doomsday did not occur, its portrayal of global food shortages and the impact of pollutants on human health remains a stark, albeit exaggerated, reflection of modern environmental anxieties.