GUNG-HO

Gung-Ho is a movie about the takeover of an American automobile factory in Hadleyville, Pennsylvania by a Japanese company. The term Gung Ho is a Chinese expression for “work together” which is what the movie is about. As the Americans and Japanese attempt to work together the viewers are able to see the cross-cultural conflicts and huge misunderstandings that happen throughout the movie because of the differences in culture, work attitude, management styles, and values between the two countries. The movie also goes on to show us exactly what the two countries think of each other. All of this is brought to you in a very funny and forgiving way where we see at the end of the movie the two sides come together and achieve a …show more content…

This is a combination of individualism versus collectivism as well as a Power Distance

Power Distance is how the power is distributed in a company. Western countries including the United States usually have small power distance because everyone is treated equally no matter the position they hold. Americans are more concerned with how each person participates no matter how high up on the ladder you are. Japanese on the other hand have a very high power distance. People higher up on the ladder are always seen applying their power to the people below them. This is most evident during the first few minutes of the movie when you see how the people are treated during the Japanese manager training. The people taking the training have no rights and are always obedient and are apologetic for being the way they are. They are treated exactly how we treat people in military boot-camp.

Another one of Hofstede’s dimensions of culture values is uncertainty avoidance, which is a measurement of how much members are anxious about things they are unsure about, so they tend to minimize uncertainty to cope. As with everything else in this movie, the Japanese and Americans are on the opposite ends of this measurement. The Japanese have very high