Gung Ho is one of the funniest film comedies to hit the screens in years. But beyond funny, it has several incisive yet painless lessons for all of us: the lessons of culture shock and cross-culture clash, beautifully resolved through tolerance and understanding. There is life, it seems, after cooperation. Although the film features Japanese workers and executives, the Gung Ho title is actually a bit of Chinese slang meaning something like "let's work together." The term itself never comes up in the movie, but the theme is evident throughout.
The film is directed by young and rising Ron Howard (yes, the same little Opie who was seen on television years ago with Andy Griffith), who recently distinguished himself by directing Night Shift, Splash, and Cocoon. Howard stars his Night Shift surprise player, Michael Keaton, opposite Mimi Rogers as his patient and supportive mate. Costarring and weighty character actor George Wendt and Japanese players Gedde Watanabe (of Volunteers) and Soh Yamamura, who is acclaimed in Japan as a National Treasure--something like a Japanese Laurence Olivier.
The time from for the film is now; the setting is a small American steel town in depressed western Pennsylvania, where everybody is out of work. People are spending their welfare checks in the bars, wondering whether the closed-down automobile factory will ever open again. Their town, near Pittsburgh, has turned into Pitsville along with their lives, and though something has to be done, nobody is doing anything beyond taking the local beer inventory.
Enter Hunt Stevenson (Michael Keaton), one of their most well-liked drinking buddies. He's brash and gutsy, easily a notch or two above the other guys, and he has a fantastic idea. If the slipping American economy is unable to create employment, why not turn to a country that seems to have a yen for business success: Japan! So, Hunt kisses his sweetheart good-bye, hops a jet to Tokyo, and amidst a horrible--but sadly typical--example of unintentionally playing the Ugly American, he manages, despite himself and his swaggering taste, to woo the Japanese businessmen to come to Pennsylvania to reopen the plant and produce little Japanese cars.
When the Japanese crew arrives to a flag-waving welcome in Pittsburgh, all the plot elements are essentially in place. From this point onward the film is a predictable but fascinating portrayal of East-West conflict in both business and social matters. The Japanese bosses expect all rehired workers to do twenty minutes of calisthenics in the parking lot before the workday begins. "No way!" say the local boys. "That's not in our contract." The Japanese work in teams with team pride; the Americans work as competing individuals, expect individual rewards and raises, and have little or no pride in workmanship. The Japanese lose face if their cars have defects, and they voluntarily stay overtime to compensate and catch up. The American guys don't really care about defects and if they work overtime, they want pay at time and a half. The Japanese have strict work ethics, and they give their all for the company. The Americans smoke cigars on the job, listen to rock tapes, and read the newspaper in the men's room. The Japanese won't even let a worker take time off when his son enters the hospital for surgery! Unthinkable for the Americans!
As all these conflicts escalate and lead toward alienation instead of economic salvation, boldly into this breach of
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