Mr. "The World on Time" gets his clock cleaned.

Rating: Null/10 (25 December 2000)

*** POSSIBLE SPOILER REGARDING MOVIE SCORE***
Just coming back from seeing this movie on Christmas Day. I think Tom Hanks has another Oscar nomination coming. One of the most interesting things is that there is absolutely no movie score or other music for the first 75 minutes of a 143-minute film. It works. Music would get in the way.
Hanks is a FedEx "motivator" for problem offices. The film opens with him telling Moscow workers that wasting time is a sin and unforgivable, all the while starting the official office timer which counts down the time remaining before the truck has to leave to take the packages to the airport. We also learn that Hanks one time stole (he claims "borrowed") a bicycle to get a package to its destination on time.
A trick he uses to pressure the employees is that he sends himself a package from Memphis, TN (his home and FedEx HQ) to Moscow. It's a digital timer, running. It shows 87+ hours lapsed. Hanks yells at the employees that that is disgraceful.
It is ironic (and to me, very satisfying) that Mr. "The World on Time" not only gets his clock cleaned, but his world turned upside down and is cosmically told "Here, make sense of THAT."
The comic strip "Sally Forth" attributed to FedEx this trend (and corresponding time pressure) and called it "artificial urgency". How many
things are done just in time (more accurately know as "at the last minute") not because it is necessary, but because the capability is there? There are a few people I know--worshippers of "just in time"-- who I think should be "cast away" as a lesson.