DIRECTOR: Eric Daniel Metzgar | USA  | 99 minutes |

The story seen in the national press went like this: A decade earlier, a writer eating in a Chinese restaurant in Manhattan spotted a diamondback terrapin turtle in a tank, about to be chopped up for soup. The horrified writer, Richard Ogust, stopped the execution, bought the turtle for 20 bucks and installed her in a tank at home, naming her "The Empress." And that started him on a quest to save the world's endangered turtles, to which he devoted ever more of his time and resources. When the national and international media found him, Ogust was portrayed as a somewhat eccentric figure sharing a Manhattan penthouse with 1,200 turtles, including several species extinct in the wild. It became an "only in New York" moment in the entertainment firmament.

But the documentary "The Chances of the World Changing" dives well beneath the media's quirky account, revealing a complex story that remained largely untold. In fact, the filmmakers discovered that the writer-turned-conservationist's journey was just beginning.

PREVIEW: Click Here

"A film about extinction is really a study of its opposing force: survival," says director Eric Daniel Metzgar of the two years he and co-producer Nell Carden Grey spent with Ogust. "When one is fraught with immeasurable responsibility, an excess of strength, not gloom, powers the day. And that strength, again and again, in the face of all obstacles, is what we filmed. Each day hovered on the next, and from an urgent story emerged a grand narrative."

www.chancesoftheworldchanging.com

$10.00 General Admission

$7.00 Students with ID