Ronning: I think in a way, Espen and I saw a little bit of ourselves in Thor Heyerdahl. So there’s a fine line between national icon and insane person who died on a little raft in the middle of the ocean. THR: He survived, so he was a hero, but had he died, he’d have been a crazy person. But that being said, he probably didn’t sell 50 million of the Kon-Tiki book because people are into migration theory it’s because he was also a great storyteller and adventurer. I think that the more doors that got slammed in his face, the more determined he became into proving his theory, and I think it was important for him to prove that they could have done it, they could have sailed from Peru to Polynesia 1500 years ago. Ronning: I think he had a very strong urge to question authority. And while that seems to be wrong, the way he tried to prove it became his legacy. THR: He had this theory, that people had moved from South America to Asia. Sandberg: Yes, he’s definitely a hero back home. THR: Is he a huge national hero in Norway? And Thor Heyerdahl, he was also the only Norwegian to win an Academy Award, and he was also a filmmaker, and in that regard, a huge inspiration for us. And we even decided when we were ten or eleven years old that we wanted to become filmmakers, so we’ve been going at it for a while. He always had a presence when we grew up, and Espen and I, we started making films together when we were about ten years old, actually. We’re from a small town in the south of Norway, and it’s only ten minutes away from where Thor Heyerdahl comes from. Ronning: Well the story of Kon-Tiki and Thor Heyerdahl’s voyage across the Pacific always had a presence. If you made it as a fiction movie, it’d be too unbelievable. THR: I know it’s a true story, but it’s almost too insane to be true. Just making a film about the adventure was a massive feat, and in a recent chat, the pair told The Hollywood Reporter about the crazy production. Now, nearly 65 years since the first journey, the trip has been re-created in a film by Norwegian directors Joachim Ronning and Espen Sandberg the movie was nominated for an Oscar earlier this year, and is now opening in American theaters. Heyerdahl became a hero and celebrity, selling 50 million copies of his book about the journey, and winning an Oscar for the documentary about his time at sea, as well. Despite all the odds, the trip was a success, a 4,300 mile journey made in 101 days with all its crew alive and well.

Kon tiki voyage