Cooked: Survival by Zip Code
- Thursday June 05, 2025 7:00 PM
Directed by Judith Helfand, 2018
NR, 82 minutes
In the summer of 1995, Chicago experienced an unthinkable disaster, when extremely high humidity and a layer of heat-retaining pollution drove the heat index up to more than 126 degrees. Cooked: Survival by Zip Code tells the story of this tragic heatwave, the most traumatic in U.S. history, in which 739 citizens—most of them poor, elderly, and Black—died over the course of a single week. The documentary goes beyond the shocking headlines, revealing the undercovered long-term crisis of pernicious poverty, economic and social isolation, and racism. Cooked is a story about life, death, and the politics of crisis in an American city that asks the question: was this a one-time tragedy or an appalling trend?
Movies That Matter is a free bi-monthly film series program of the City of Fort Worth's Human Relations Commission that celebrates diversity and inclusion. Each event features a film screening, followed by a moderated discussion with local subject matter experts.