There are several very bright and bold points in this documentary: First, former US President Barack Obama cast and produced; second, the starring is Cao Dewang, the founder of China Fuyao Glass Group ; third, the incident took place in the post-industrial Ohio , USA , Dayton, plagued by unemployment; the fourth is the fierce collision between the soul of Chinese companies and the body of American factories.
At first Cao Dewang understood it as an international promotional film, but the two directors, Julia Reichert and Steven Bognar, lived in Dayton and knew the situation of unemployed blue-collar workers after the financial crisis. They insisted on shooting from a documentary perspective for 3 years, and the footage exceeded 3,000 hours . Finally, the various contradictions and conflicts encountered in the process of localization of the factory were recorded, and the appearance of "the largest factory invested by Chinese manufacturing in the United States" was truly restored.
A biography of Cao Dewang
Born in May 1946, from Fuqing, Fuzhou, Fujian Province, founder and chairman of Fuyao Glass Group. Fuyao Glass Group was established in 1987 and is currently the No. 1 supplier of automotive glass in China and the No. 2 supplier in the world. According to Cao Dewang in an interview, Fuyao Glass has already ranked first in the world in sales.
An American factory, a Chinese company
l Start the honeymoon period
"A once desolate community has been given hope by you."
This sentence comes from the mouths of American workers in the documentary.
In the post-industrial era of Dayton, Ohio, the General Motors plant with high welfare benefits has achieved the middle-class dream of the surrounding residents, but with its sudden closure, thousands of people have lost the houses, cars and corresponding middle-class people they bought with loans. Affluent life. In 2016, a Chinese billionaire, the chairman of China Fuyao Glass, Cao Dewang , invested US$1 billion to take over the long-abandoned General Motors plant. The unemployed workers from the General Motors plant finally got rid of their stagnant lives. Welcome to the new life.
US Congressman: "We heard two presidential candidates refer to Ohio as the rust belt. Looking at the scene today, we reject that title."
Hope and optimism spread across this land, and a golden autumn ceremony with a strong Chinese flavor pushed the atmosphere to a climax. However, the unexpected speech of the US congressman - "Whether you want to join the trade union" laid the foreshadowing of the beginning of the honeymoon period. The conflict between high-tech Chinese companies and the American working class is undercurrent.
l Cao Dewang: "Do as the Romans do"
The Chinese construction manager planned to hang a painting representing China and a painting representing the United States in the office, but Cao Dewang refused: only hang the American ones, do as the locals do!
This sentence, doing as the locals do, seems to indicate his belief in building an American factory in the early days. Fuyao's Dayton factory employs Americans as president and other key management positions, as well as more than 2,000 American blue-collar workers, with a solid American body.
However, differences in culture, system and ideology seem to be inevitable after the factory is officially launched. American workers have a rambunctious style and like to chat and smoke at work, even if they have been embarrassed because of unemployment; while Chinese workers need "militarized management" at regular morning meetings, shouting slogans and expressing their determination in a uniform manner. The expectations of the hometown wife and children. Under such circumstances, the company has been slow to meet production targets, and American workers feel that they have squeezed the labor force, complaining about overtime hours and reduced wages. The harsh working environment and safety production loopholes have also raised calls for unions to settle in.
At this time, Cao Dewang hired Liu Daochuan to make drastic reform measures as the new person in charge, and organized American supervisors to visit the Fujian factory for training; Unreliable workers' union system; expel some "union movement" advocates.
The U.S. Labor and Management Committee organized an official vote to discuss "Does Fuyao need a union?" Among the 1,500 American workers, 444 voted in favor and 868 against. Fuyao won the war and turned a profit in 2018 . Fuyao's next step is to replace "too inefficient" (American) labor with automated machines. At this time, the American body of the Fuyao factory is no longer so hard, and the Chinese soul has the absolute upper hand.
Obama used the film as his first film to implement his consistent "globalization" proposition. This film may be a counterattack to his successor Trump's "de-globalization" policy (The Beijing News view).
2. "Overbearing President" Cao Dewang
l Rationalist "personality"
There is a detail in the documentary that caused a lot of heated discussion. When American executives David and Cao Dewang reported on the construction of the Golden Autumn Festival, they proposed to add a roof to the venue to prevent it from raining that day. Discuss. On the day of the celebration, the sky was clear, and the vice president joked that "Chairman Cao arranged the weather" .
"The door can't open in this direction" (the cost is $35,000 for remodeling); "The fire alarm can't be placed in the middle of the wall, it looks badly decorated"; "The union comes in and we close the door"... ...Similar strong remarks made netizens jokingly call Cao an "overbearing president".
People reported that Cao Dewang mentioned that he and his wife were the orders of his parents and the matchmaker. After marriage, he met his true love and tried his best to reorganize the family with his confidante, but after his wife finally agreed, he gave up at the final moment of decision. divorced. Because he did a family survey and it turns out that a hundred representative couples are not absolutely happy, even if someone looks like a match made in heaven to the outside world.
Cao Dewang said: "I don't think I need to think about changing the family anymore. It's useless to change 1,000 more."
He has since become a firm believer in rationalism and a very decisive and rational entrepreneur.
l A firm supporter of the "Chinese Dream"
"The most important thing for us is not how much money we make, but to get Americans to change their view of the Chinese, their view of China."
In many interviews, Cao Dewang repeatedly mentioned that he no longer needs to make money, and he now runs businesses to meet the needs of the country. He said, I am doing a great cause, in order to make China stronger through joint efforts, because the party and the country have been very kind to me, without reform and opening up, there would be no me, and there would be no Fuyao.
Cao Dewang is an authentic farmer who has not attended school for a few years. From contracting small township enterprises, he has created the world's largest auto glass manufacturing enterprise step by step. Almost every step of development is a testimony to reform and opening up.
In his eyes, a great entrepreneur should look like this:
"He's a character, and he has to be accountable to history."
"The country will be strong because of you, the society will progress because of you, and the people will be rich because of you."
"American Factory" is an artistic documentary, and it is also a true testimony of Chinese companies investing in the United States.
Whether it is "American Factory" as a work of art, or Cao Dewang's "American Factory" as an industrial miracle, they all deserve more thought and attention.
The full article is here, hee hee
https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/TgemT4zNyt1smE81vYFB4w
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