World's Major Environmental and Indigenous Groups Endorse 'Avatar' for Best Picture

Ads in Hollywood Magazines Show Pandora's Unobtanium is Canada's Tar Sands

HOLLYWOOD, Calif., March 4 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The world's best known environmental groups, representing eight countries, along with indigenous groups, are running full-page ads today in two Hollywood magazines. An ad in Variety signed by 55 groups praises filmmaker James Cameron for bringing to light in film what is playing out in reality in Canada's controversial tar sands.

The ad, part of a special Oscar edition, has the headline "James Cameron and Avatar: You Have Our Vote." The ad shows a 797B Heavy Hauler, one of the first trucks used to mine the tar sands, which is identical to some of the trucks used in Avatar. It also shows the vast open pit mines and tailings ponds that cut across what was once pristine Boreal forest - the same forest that stretched across Cameron's hometown in Ontario.

"We want Hollywood, and the powerful thought leaders there, to know Avatar does a great job of exposing the tar sands," said Rick Smith of Environmental Defence Canada. "It's the world's most destructive project - Pandora's unobtanium is Canada's tar sands."

Sierra Club is running a similar ad today in The Hollywood Reporter. The group is also calling on Americans to send an email to President Obama asking for clean energy, not dirty fuels like tar sands oil.

"Avatar is like one big advertisement for our fight against tar sands oil," said Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope. "This is one of the most destructive projects on Earth and we can't let it expand into the U.S."

The Sierra Club petition and video are available here: http://action.sierraclub.org/site/PageNavigator/Avatar_clean_energy_petition.

The ads are part of a mounting campaign in the United States to stop tar sands expansion. Environmental groups and U.S. communities are increasingly concerned about the massive network of pipelines and refineries proposed to bring tar sands oil into the U.S.

The complete list of groups and the ad can be viewed at www.dirtyoilsands.org.

SOURCE Sierra Club