JOHN HANZEL E.

LIMBO
MBA
MOVIE REFLECTION GUNG HO
Quality is extremely important to the Japanese executives. From the moment they
arrive in the American plant, they pride themselves on the superiority of their automobiles in
comparison to American automobiles and hold to the employees work to seemingly impossible
standards of efficiency and quality. They are constantly critiquing the employees work on the
car demanding that their methods of productions be adapted in the plant. Oishi Kazihiro
explains to Mr. Keaton several times the pride that Japanese works take in the work and the
extend there are willing to the go in order to get their work done; staying after hours with no
play to complete their work. Also the incredible amount of shame their experience of their
company does poorly. The Japanese refuse to even produce cars of subpar standards and when
the CEO arrives, refuses to count any cars with minor imperfections.
Gung Ho delivers everything it promises in terms of laughs and astute cross-cultural insights.
Drawn from real life, the conflict between cultures is good for both a laugh and a sober thought along
the way. Director Ron Howard has problems straddling the two, sometimes getting bogged down in the
social significance.
During the first day of work, the Japanese executives wish to begin the day with
calisthenics, to which the Americans also find comical and refuse to perform. When Mr. Keaton
goes to meet with the Japan executives, they all give them a business card, a customary action
during a Japanese business meeting, to which Mr. Keaton mocks. Japanese executives eat their
lunches with chopsticks and bathe together in the river near the factory which the American
works find both absurd and mock as well. Finally one of the Japanese overseers refuses to allow
one of the American employees to take a newspaper into the bathroom to read; which is a norm
in American culture.
The Japanese introduce job rotation so that every man is capable of performing every job.
As oppose to the previous American methodology of allowing each employee to specialize in a
specific job on the production line, the Japanese demand that each man can perform any job with
quality and effectiveness. In Japanese factories, all employees are able to do so, and this is
expected of the American employees.