Review: ‘Kon-Tiki’

“Kon-Tiki” is a great Norwegian historical drama about explorer and scientist Thor Heyerdahl, who set out on a journey in 1947 with five men on a raft made of balsa wood from Peru all the way across the Pacific Ocean to Polynesia, in an attempt to help prove his theory that Polynesia was populated by migrants coming from the east, as opposed to the prevailing theory at the time that the settlers came from the west. But really it is a story about how this fella Thor had an idea and was determined to see it through, even if that meant absorbing tons of rejection from all sorts of people and eventually heading out on this dangerous mission just to prove his point.

This is a pretty spectacular movie regardless of whether the story is real or what was fabricated to enhance the drama of the movie (apparently there was some beef with one of the characters being portrayed very differently from his real life counterpart, resulting in the filmmakers even coming out and apologizing to the family members of this misrepresented person). It is a pretty simple set up, in that these six guys agreed to set out on this mission, and the 101-day, 5,000 mile journey pretty much changed them all forever (but then again, how could it NOT?). But while the mission and goal are easy to understand, it is obvious that the trip was not going to be a piece of cake.

And sure enough, a lot of the craziness of this movie stems from the water-logged journey, which has the crew battling a fierce storm and monster waves, sharks, seasickness, damage to the raft itself, and whatever else could possibly cause a problem on such a voyage. It is a bit surprising how little friction came up between these men, as they were all stuck together on a small raft for over three months together, so surely there would have been more snickering and back biting and arguing, but in reality it appears that some of the drama between the characters was manufactured for the movie because the actual trip went very well, so I suppose all the guys just got along swimmingly (see what I did there?). I know if I was on a boat with 5 other guys for three months, I would be snapping at them after a short amount of time. But not these Norwegians. They got each other’s backs the whole way through, and the little bit of arguing they did actually did not matter one bit.

And apparently they shot all of the water scenes out in actual open water, as opposed to on sets and with CG and green screens, and this obviously helps the movie a lot because it made the challenges of such a voyage even more apparent. And you really can’t beat a real panoramic shot of a huge horizon, with water spread out as far as the eye can see, a gigantic sky overhead covered in clouds and painted by the sunset. Sure you can do this with CG, like in “Life of Pi,” or you can go out and shoot the real thing. I, for one, enjoy the latter approach more.

This is a well made movie, and at $15 million, the biggest budgeted Norwegian film ever made, and it seems to have been worth it because the film was nominated for Best Foreign Picture at the 85^th Academy Awards, it grossed over $20 million worldwide (which is an international blockbuster sized hit for Norway), and it landed the Norwegian directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg the directing gig for “Pirates of the Caribbean 5.” So that’s a win for them. Good job, fellas. I’m actually interested in seeing the next POTC movie because of this directing duo, so that says a lot about their skill on display with making this movie.