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Young Woman and the Sea allowed Norwegian director Joachim Rønning to return to his roots in more ways than one.

As he was helming Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) and Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (2019) for Disney, Rønning was in development on a biopic about Olympic swimmer Gertrude “Trudy” Ederle, who became the first woman to swim across the English Channel in 1926. What would normally seem like a big left turn for a filmmaker who’d been steeped in fantasy worlds was actually a return to the genre of historical drama that first launched his Hollywood career.

In 2013, Rønning and co-director Espen Sanderg’s Norwegian film, Kon-Tiki, received an Oscar nomination for best foreign language film at the 85th Academy Awards. The picture chronicled Thor Heyerdahl’s 1947 expedition from South America to the islands of Polynesia, as both Kon-Tiki and Young Woman and the Sea are...

Director Joachim Rønning talks exclusively to us about his original sci-fi project, Here There Be Monsters, which will be a nautical take on Jaws and The Thing.

First announced in 2018, Here There Be Monsters was billed as an original sci-fi project co-written by Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales co-director Joachim Rønning. At the time, little was revealed about its plot beyond it being a genre film set at sea.

Speaking to Film Stories ahead of the release of his latest movie, the period biopic Young Woman And The Sea, however, Rønning has revealed a telling new detail about Here There Be Monsters. Confirming that it’ll be set at sea – something of a signature location for the Norwegian filmmaker – Rønning added that it’s inspired by a couple of monster movies you might have heard of.

“As a filmmaker, you have to be developing many projects,...

With the Academy Awards just a month away, it’s the perfect time to look at fun facts, trivia and tidbits for both this year and historically.

John Williams, who just turned 91, reaped his 53rd Oscar nomination for scoring Steven Spielberg’s movie memoir “The Fabelmans.” Three of his five Oscar wins are for Spielberg films. His first Oscar nomination was for Best Music for 1967’s “Valley of the Dolls” and his first win was for Best Music (scoring adaptation and original song score) for 1971’s “Fiddler on the Roof.” And what was the first film he scored? The long-forgotten 1958 Aip release 1958 “Daddy-o.”

In terms of nominations, Williams is second only to Walt Disney. During his 40-plus year film career, he received 26 Oscar — 22 of those were competitive — and a staggering 59 bids. At the 5th Oscars, he won an honorary Oscar for creating Mickey Mouse, while winning the Academy Award for...

The movie awards’ season is in full flower with such films as Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog”; Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story”; Kenneth Branagh’s “Belfast,” Guillermo Del Toro’s “Nightmare Alley” and Joel Coen’s “The Tragedy of Macbeth” among the favorites for top prizes. But one thing we know for certain is that there is no sure thing when it comes to the Oscars. Consider the case of seventy years ago. Not only were there surprises among the nominees, but there were also some shocks when it came to the winners of the 1952 Oscars.

Let’s revisit the 24th Academy Awards, which took place March 20, 1952 at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood and were hosted by Danny Kaye. This was the last time the ceremony was presented on radio. The show moved to television the following year. Among the presenters that evening were Lucille Ball,...

The famed Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen led the first expedition to reach the South Pole, so when you watch “Amundsen: The Greatest Expedition,” you may think you’ve got a good idea of the movie you have in store: an adventure at once exciting and treacherous, set in the frozen wilderness, with a stoic Nordic hero at its center — the kind of man who might have been played a few decades ago by Max von Sydow. “Amundsen” has scattered moments of tense physical drama, set against glacial Arctic vistas of fantastic authenticity. You really feel like you’re there.

The movie opens with two men in a propeller plane conking out in the middle of the icy nowhere. One of them is the aging Roald Amundsen (Pål Sverre Hagen), who reveals a hawkish profile of calm, imperious, almost sneering indomitability; the other is a man who can no longer feel his feet.

Chilean indigenous communities are turning to film to portray their world values, social problems and identities. That’s the case for Leo Pakarati, of the Rapa Nui from Easter Island, and Mapuche Claudia Huaiquimilla. Both will present their recent works as case studies at the European Film Market’s Chile Country in Focus.

Pakarati’s documentary plumbs the impact of colonialism on his people’s modern culture. A co-production between Paula Rossetti’s Mahatua Producciones and Nicolás López’s Sobras, “Te Kuhane o te Tupuna” explores ancestral beliefs of the Easter Island people through the relationship and dialogues of a grandfather and his granddaughter, and the story of the Moai Hoa Haka Nana’ia, one of the fabulous effigies of the island, stolen by British Commodore Richard Ashmore Powell in 1868 and offered to Queen Victoria.

“In my family, the oral tradition is of utmost importance, and knowing the history of...

“Deadpool” and “Homeland” actress Morena Baccarin will star in the survival thriller “Beast,” to be directed by Espen Sandberg, who co-helmed Oscar-nominated “Kon-Tiki” and “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales.”

Based on Aaron W. Sala’s Blacklist script, “Beast” is about a woman who survives a plane crash and is stranded on a seemingly deserted island in the South Pacific. “She must fight to get back to her children, face her inner demons and a real threat of unimaginable proportions,” according to a statement from the producers.

Sherryl Clark and Kenneth Huang are producing for The H Collective alongside Rakuten’s Mickey Mikitani. Shooting will begin in late March in New Zealand. “Beast” is the first film under the joint venture between Rakuten and The H Collective, who first partnered in August.

Sandberg said: “For me ‘The Beast’ is a story about a woman who is forced...

In case you were wondering if Disney was still developing their Maleficent sequel, the answer is yes. According to Variety, Ed Skrein, the actor who played the villain in Deadpool, is now in final negotiations to play the villain in Maleficent.

There are no details on who he'll exactly be playing, but he will join Angelina Jolie and Elle Fanning who will be reprising their roles from the first film.

I wasn't the biggest fan of the first movie, but the sequel does have a talented director. The movie will be directed by Joachim Ronning, who previously helmed Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales and the film adaptation of Kon-Tiki which told the story of the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl and his oceanic expedition. That's such an incredibly well-made film.

There are no details on what the story of the sequel will be, but the original film...

Producer Jerry Bruckheimer released on Twitter the first photo of Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow in Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, directed by Espen Sandberg & Joachim Rønning (“Kon-Tiki”).

The fifth entry in the blockbuster franchise will film entirely at Village Roadshow Studios and on locations within Queensland, Australia.

Johnny Depp is joined by Oscar winner Javier Bardem (“No Country for Old Men,” “Skyfall”), Kaya Scodelario (“The Maze Runner,” British television’s “Skins”), Brenton Thwaites (“Maleficent,” “The Giver”) and Golshifteh Farahani (“The Patience Stone,” “Exodus: Gods and Kings”).

Rejoining the action are Academy Award winner Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa, Kevin R. McNally as Joshamee Gibbs and Stephen Graham as Scrum.

Thrust into an all-new adventure, a down-on-his-luck Captain Jack Sparrow finds the winds of ill-fortune blowing even more strongly when deadly ghost pirates led by his old nemesis, the terrifying Captain Salazar (Bardem), escape from the Devil’s Triangle,...

Danish major Nordisk Film, which has not produced a film in Norway since Kon-Tiki in 2012, will rearm its Norwegian production unit and start to make films again.

Aage Aaberge confirmed that he will return as head of Nordisk Film Production, which he ran between 2003-2008. His own production company, Neofilm, will be fused into the new set-up.

“I will move to Egmont House – Nordisk’s headquarters in Nydalen, northern Oslo – at the beginning of May, and first will hire some people,” Aaberge told ScreenDaily.

“And yes – Nordisk both wants to make more films, and bigger films.”

When the group sold TV production company Nordisk Film TV to France’s Banijay Group in 2009, it more or less terminated its involvement in Norwegian film production, mainly children and family pictures.

Nordisk’s only Norwegian feature since 2009 is Kon-Tiki, produced by Aaberge for Nordisk, and UK producer Jeremy Thomas for his Recorded Picture Company.

Directed by [link...

The fifth film in Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean" series has begun filming. Here's the press release the company issued today to celebrate the news which also includes a detailed new synopsis. Here's the press release in full:

Queens Land, Australia (February 18, 2015) – Production has commenced on location in Australia on Disney and Jerry Bruckheimer Films' epic comedy adventure "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales," directed by Espen Sandberg & Joachim Rønning ("Kon-Tiki"), the fifth entry in the blockbuster franchise inspired by the classic Disney Theme Parks attraction, which has reaped $3.7 billion in worldwide box office.

"Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales" will film entirely at Village Roadshow Studios and on locations within Queensland, Australia.

Thrust into an all-new adventure, a down-on-his-luck Captain Jack Sparrow finds the winds of ill-fortune blowing even more strongly when deadly ghost pirates led by his old nemesis, the terrifying...

Production has commenced on location in Australia on Disney and Jerry Bruckheimer Films’ epic comedy adventure Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, directed by Espen Sandberg & Joachim Rønning (“Kon-Tiki”), the fifth entry in the blockbuster franchise inspired by the classic Disney Theme Parks attraction, which has reaped $3.7 billion in worldwide box office.

Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales will film entirely at Village Roadshow Studios and on locations within Queensland, Australia.

Johnny Depp returns to his iconic, Academy Award-nominated role of Captain Jack Sparrow, one of the most beloved characters in motion picture history, newly joined by Oscar winner Javier Bardem (“No Country for Old Men,” “Skyfall”), rising young stars Kaya Scodelario (“The Maze Runner,” British television’s “Skins”) and Brenton Thwaites (“Maleficent,” “The Giver”) and Golshifteh Farahani (“The Patience Stone,” “Exodus: Gods and Kings”).

Rejoining the action are Academy Award winner Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa,...

Directors: Joachim Rønning, Espen Sandberg; Screenwriters: Petter Skavlan, Allan Scott; Starring: Pål Sverre Hagen, Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Gustaf Skarsgård; Running time: 118 mins; Certificate: 15

He may not wield a hammer and a red cape is surplus to his sartorial requirements, but the Thor at the centre of the epic adventure Kon-Tiki has more than enough drive and passion to compensate. Nominated for an Oscar and Golden Globe way back in 2013, the wait for this gem to wash up on UK shores has been a long but ultimately rewarding one - not unlike the central narrative of the film.

Based on the stunning true tale of a Norwegian's quest to prove historical 'fact' wrong, this impressively immersive movie places you right at the heart of Thor Heyerdahl's (Pål Sverre Hagen) brave but borderline suicidal mission in 1947 to cross 4,300 miles of the Pacific Ocean in a balsa wood raft built without modern...

Exclusive: Two years after it first debuted, Oscar-nominated Kon-Tiki will finally be seen by UK cinemagoers.

Soda Pictures has acquired the UK-Eire rights to Kon-Tiki from the Weinstein Company.

The film will be released in the UK on December 19, with a special presentation at the Curzon Mayfair cinema in London.

Based on a true story, the historical drama centres on the 1947 expedition by Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl who travelled on a raft across the Pacific Ocean to prove that Polynesians had South American roots.

The film was shot in both English and Norwegian and went on to be a major box office success in Norway, critically acclaimed around the world and nominated for an Oscar, Golden Globe and European Film Award.

It won four Norwegian Academy Awards including the People’s Choice Award for the two directors, Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg. It was produced by Jeremy Thomas and Aage Aaberge.

The UK deal...

An Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Language Film, the old-school high-seas adventure epic that reintroduces the inspiring historical feat of Thor Heyerdahl from Norwegian directors Joachim Roenning and Espen Sandberg sails past every opportunity to chart the deeper waters of human emotion, but the worthwhile story and sophisticated visual effects keep Kon-Tiki afloat.

As history goes, Norwegian ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl was convinced, after ten years of field work, that Polynesia was populated from the East by South Americans, despite conventional wisdom that Asians settled the island (with which genetic findings from contemporary anthropologists agree). His theory was rejected by scientific publishers including National Geographic, but rather than accepting the death sentence of his dissertation, the explorer embarked on the 5,000 mile journey that he believed Peruvians made 1,500 years earlier. Using a faithfully constructed, self-built balsa wood raft named after Incan sun god Kon-Tiki, Heyerdahl proved that oceans were not barriers,...

Norway’s Oscar nominee for Best Foreign Language Film Of The Year is finally sailing in on DVD and Blu-ray. From Anchor Bay Entertainment and The Weinstein Company, Kon-tiki is available to own now and will remind you of how Hollywood used to do movies. This is one you will want to add to your collection.

From the directing duo of Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg (Max Manus: Man of War, Bandidas), Kon-tiki is based on the amazing true adventure of Thor Heyderdahl (Pål Sverre Hagen), a Norwegian explorer in 1947 who embarks on the voyage of a lifetime to prove a point.

In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl (Pål Hagen) embarks on an astonishing expedition – a journey of 4,300 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on the Kon-Tiki raft. From his days living in the Marquesas with his wife Liv (Agnes Kittlesen), Thor...

Nominated in 2012 at both the Golden Globes and the Oscars for Best Foreign Language Film Of The Year, Norwegian production “Kon-Tiki," from directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg (who are slated to helm “Pirates of the Caribbean 5” off the strength of this film), adapts Thor Heyerdahl's 1948 international bestseller “The Kon-Tiki Expedition: By Raft Across the South Seas” into a big screen thriller.Heyerdahl believed that people from South America could have settled Polynesia in pre-Columbian times (although most anthropologists now believe they did not), but he faced serious opposition in the anthropology community and his theory gained little credence. His response was to mount an expedition from Peru to Polynesia, using only the materials and technologies available to those people at the time, to prove it was possible. It was a 101 day trip, covering 6900 km, on a raft. In our review from Göteborg, our own Jessica Kiang praised “the.

Did you see Kon-tiki when it was in theaters earlier this year? It is an amazing adventure and the kind of film we avid movie goers haven’t seen in a long time.

Based on the amazing true adventure of Thor Heyderdahl (Pål Sverre Hagen), Kon-tiki is the tale of a Norwegian explorer in 1947 who embarks on the voyage of a lifetime to prove a point. When the scientific community rejects his theory that South Americans were the first to settle in the Polynesian Islands, Heyerdahl resolves to prove its validity—and save his reputation—by embarking on the voyage himself. Recruiting a group of five men who are just bold enough to tackle the seemingly impossible trip, he builds a simple raft to original pre-Columbian specifications and sets off on the epic 101 day-long journey across the treacherous ocean to meet his fate, while the world watches.

In case you...

Having landed a Best Foreign Language Film nomination for last year’s Kon-Tiki, which dramatized Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl’s dramatic journey across the Pacific on a small raft, directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg have been rewarded with another boat movie. Indeed, the biggest boat movie of them all, Disney’s Pirates Of The Caribbean 5: Johnny Depp Is Still Drunk On A Boat On Misty Rolling Tides Of Intrigue Or Whatever, which the duo landed after considerable competition from directors like Rupert Sanders. “It’s a case of these guys getting hot at exactly the right time ...

In a summer chock full of sequels, threequels, and all the other iterations of successful franchises refusing to leave money on the table, we almost forgot about the looming fifth installment of the Pirates of the Caribbean. Wednesday, news broke that the Oscar-nominated directing pair Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg were in final negotiations to helm Pirates of the Caribbean 5, which is expected to begin shooting in January for a July 10, 2015 release.

Rønning and Sandberg are best known for directing the epic Kon-Tiki, a fictionalized take on Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl’s 101-day expedition across the Pacific Ocean on a wooden raft.

With the season of Summer blockbusters already in full swing here in the middle of May, you may have a tough time recalling the nominees for Best Foreign Language Film from the 85th Academy Awards ceremony way back in February. We here at the website have gotten to see the winner, Armour, and two other nominees, No and A Royal Affair (War Witch has yet to screen in our neck-of-the-woods). Now we finally get to see the entry from Norway, Kon-tiki. And it turns out that this is the perfect time for this film, for this isn’t a somber, human drama like Haneke’s intimate portrait, but a rollicking, edge-of-your-seat adventure. Yes, it is a true story set in the past like No and Affair, but after the heroes set out to sea, it feels as though their exploits could be happening right now. The story of the voyage...

One of the five films nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar last year was Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg's "Kon-Tiki." It was the first Norwegian film to be nominated for both an Oscar and a Golden Globe and it was actually filmed in both Norwegian and English. The latter version was released on two screens stateside two weeks ago and is platforming out slowly, moving into more markets today. I actually liked the film, and really, it's difficult to not be engaged by the story it tells. The tale of Thor Heyerdahl and his Kon-Tiki expedition is legendary, and...

News Simon Brew 10 May 2013 - 06:35

There's no Rob Marshall or Gore Verbisnki - so who's going to be directing Johnny Depp in Pirates Of The Caribbean 5?

It's little secret that Disney is pressing ahead with a fifth Pirates Of The Caribbean movie, which has already been scheduled for the summer of 2015. After all, it's arguably now the most critic-proof franchise on the planet, outside of Transformers. The last three films have been really quite poor (with the odd spark), and have gone on to make huge buckets of cash. That On Stranger Tides took over $1bn worldwide remains baffling, given its side ability to cure insomnia.

For the fifth film, it now seems all but certain that another new director is being recruited. Gore Verbisnki, who helmed the first three, was never likely to return. Rob Marshall, who directed the fourth, was a possible, but according to the latest reports,...

Chicago – Mention the name Thor Heyerdahl or his sea-faring vessel “Kon-Tiki,” and half-remembered images of a voyage across the sea in a ship that looks like it was built on “Gilligan’s Isle” might cross memory neurons. Why, when and how he did it is brought to screen in the excellent and appropriately titled “Kon-Tiki.”

Rating: 4.0/5.0

In the name and hope of man’s innate instinct to explore, “Kon-Tiki” serves as a lesson for visionaries, and was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the recent Oscars. Thor Heyerdahl simply had a higher calling to see what is “out there” and prove a point while doing it. The film meticulously and lovingly recreates the journey of that haphazard boat, and crispy reproduces the particular time frame in which it was done. All the sharks, odd sea life, storms, challenges and triumphs are explored, as well as a nicely wrought examination...

In 1947, a Norwegian ethnographer with a wild theory and a flair for adventure decided to risk all his considerable blessings in a quest for scientific validation. If no one would accept Thor Heyerdahl's hypothesis that Polynesian people could have descended from South American migrants who had sailed on rafts across the Pacific Ocean more than 1500 years ago, he would just have to make the trip himself. It was a seemingly preposterous idea, constructing a 45 foot long raft made of balsa wood logs, with just a small hut for protection, but he wanted to simulate the conditions of

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The spirit of adventure is strong for this weekend's slate of releases. We begin with the nostalgic and beautiful 1950s-era actioner about Thor Heyerdahl and his raft voyage across the Pacific Ocean -- exploring, so exciting! But there are also expeditions of a tamer, more modern sort. Michael Bay will be returning to the silver screen with loud music and 'roided-up robbers. Matthew McConaughey gets a boat stuck in a tree. An assassin must expose corrupt American government officials and rescue a pretty CIA analyst, set to the tune of flying bullets and explosions (oddly, Bay didn't direct this one). Also, a young couple embarking on the age-old expedition of marriage. So cinephiles, if you're feeling daring -- lace up those boots, mark out the route, pack your Gorp and let us know in the comments how you plan to spend your weekend in Adventureland. "Pain & Gain." Directed by Michael Bay.

Los Angeles -- The Norwegian directing team of Joachim Roenning and Espen Sandberg, whose biopic of World War II resistance fighter Max Manus was a huge hit on home turf, have turned to another native hero for "Kon-Tiki." One of the most-vaunted escapades of the 20th century, Thor Heyerdahl's 1947 Peru-to-Polynesia expedition by raft gets glossy big-screen treatment in this efficiently told action-adventure. Delivering visual drama and understated character study, sometimes in disappointingly formulaic fashion, the feature has its incisive moments but falls short as both epic and intimate portrait.

With effective immediacy, the directors dramatize some incidents from Heyerdahl's 1950 Oscar-winning documentary about the trip, and cinematographer Geir Hartly Andreassen pays tribute in re-created B&W footage of the building of the raft. Too much of the action, though, devolves into close encounters with sharks, scenes that leave the on-deck characters adrift rather than helping to define them.

The film,...

"The last three or four reps is what makes the muscle grow. This area of pain divides the champion from someone else who is not a champion." –Arnold Schwarzenegger

Greetings from the apocalypse! This was a scary-ass week for my homies in Boston. Why we gotta blow each other up, people? If we keep exploding ourselves all we'll wind up with is Charlton Heston screaming at the Statue of Liberty. Truth. Love, peace and chicken grease, y'all. Now, movies …

Friday, April 26

Pow! In Theaters

When Scarface said, "The World is Yours," there should have been an asterisk that read "*As long as you're not a complete knucklehead." That's the heavy-duty lesson Mark Wahlberg, The Rock and Anthony Mackie learn as a trio of gym rats-cum-criminals in "Pain & Gain," the latest filmsplosion from the Michael Bay ejaculatory system. The guy who brought us three "Transformers," two "Bad Boys" and one "I'd...

  Thor Heyerdahl, a Norwegian ethnographer, had a radical idea. What if the Polynesian islands were settled by South Americans who'd sailed 5,000 miles west across the Pacific in hand-built rafts thousands of years ago rather than by nearby Asians? In 1947 he put his theory to the test, building a primitive raft out of balsa wood and rope and enlisting five men to set sail with him from Peru bound for the Polynesia. The perilous voyage, dependent only on wind power and the current, was a success and Heyerdahl, who died in...

Thor Heyerdahl made history by traveling nearly 5,000 miles on a balsa-wood raft in 1947. His book about the adventure sold more than 50 million copies worldwide, and his subsequent 1951 documentary earned an Oscar. Now two Norwegian filmmakers have created a compelling new drama about the voyage of Kon-Tiki. Heyerdahl, as played by Pål Hagen, is a single-minded explorer and scientist who falls in love with Polynesia, and becomes convinced that it was discovered by South Americans who sailed there on the currents, following the sun. There’s just one problem: no one in the scientific community believes him. Undaunted, he gathers a disparate group to join him and sets sail from...

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This review was originally posted January 10th. Watch the new trailer below. Norway's Oscar-nominated Foreign-Language entry, the enjoyably supersized “Kon-Tiki,” follows the real-life adventures of explorer Thor Heyerdahl, who, in 1947, embarked on an eccentric mission across the Pacific Ocean, from Peru to Polynesia, on a wooden raft. His goal was to prove that Polynesia had been discovered and settled by ancient Peruvians, and not by Asians, as went the leading scientific belief. “The oceans aren’t barriers, but highways,” says Heyerdahl (Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen) in the film. Heyerdahl assembles a ragtag team of raftsmen, including a recently divorced refrigerator salesman who understands ship mechanics, two sailors (one a ladies’ man, the other a taciturn WWII veteran) and, importantly, a man with a movie camera. Silent, flickery black-and-white sequences pop up periodically in the film, mimicking the actual 8mm footage shot by Heyerdahl and his crew while onboard the...

Coming out of Norway and sporting a Foreign Film Oscar nomination, Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg‘s Kon-Tiki is a handsomely-made action-adventure film that feels, for the most part, like a relic of Old Hollywood. Featuring beautiful cinematography and simple characters, Kon-Tiki tells the true story of Thor Heyerdahl, the Norwegian explorer and writer who, determined to prove that South Americans [...]...

Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl’s 1947 raft trip from Peru to Polynesia, which forms the story of “Kon-Tiki,” is already the stuff of legend – particularly overseas. Heyerdahl’s own 1950 book was an international bestseller (indeed this writer remembers a battered paperback knocking around her childhood home), and the documentary he filmed during the trip itself won an Academy Award back in 1951. Which makes it a pleasing narrative to have this film, over six decades later, achieve a similar feat in getting nominated for a Foreign Language Oscar. But we have to wonder if there’s a certain sentimentality at play there (Hollywood does love a self-referential story, after all) because there is little more to “Kon-Tiki” than a fun, handsomely-mounted, old-style adventure story. And as impressive a feat as that is to achieve, especially outside of Hollywood, which kind of specialises in this sort of thing, those looking for something with...

Washington, Apr 15: The story of Kon-Tiki, a ship that sailed to prove the conventional migration theory wrong, is set to be told in a new film.

Kon-Tiki, which was little more than a raft, captured the world's imagination in 1947 when it crossed the Pacific Ocean, helmed by Norwegian adventurer and anthropologist Thor Heyerdahl.

Filmmakers Joachim Ronning told CBS News that Heyerdahl believed that the oceans were roads, basically, 1,500 years ago and he spent ten years trying to get his theory accepted and when nobody believed him, he set out to prove himself correct.

Broadcast journalist Serena Altschul said that people thought Heyerdahl was crazy.

Ronning and Espen Sandberg have brought Kon-Tiki's replica.

Kon-Tiki (2012), directed by Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg with beautiful cinematography by Geir Hartly Andreassen was shot in two different languages. The Norwegian version was nominated for an Academy Award as Best Foreign Language Film this year. The Weinstein Company will release it in English at the Paris Theatre in New York on April 26. No UK release date has yet been set.

On board the raft he helped build, docked at the North Cove Marina on the city's Hudson River, we got a chance to speak to Captain Øyvin Lauten. He sailed across the Pacific Ocean in 2006 as executive officer with Olav Heyerdahl, grandson of Thor Heyerdahl, and a crew of four like the gods before them.

In 1947, Norwegian scientist Thor Heyerdahl went on the adventure of a lifetime. Puzzled by ancient sculptures, statues and images of pineapples, he came up with the explanation that...

If you take anything away from Kon-Tiki, it's how amazingly brave the pioneers of exploration were. The film revolves around a Norwegian man's obsession with proving that someone used a raft--not a sailboat or anything with the ability to steer--to drift from Peru to Polynesia across nearly 5,000 miles of open ocean. The idea that anyone would set out to sea on a raft made of balsa wood logs strung together with rope was a daunting task in 1947, let alone a thousand years before. Having his theory nearly laughed at by everyone he approached, Thor Heyerdahl (Pål Sverre Hagen) decided to show that he and five other crewmen could recreate the raft and their methodology to make the journey themselves. If that idea...

[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...

After pulling in an Oscar nomination, Kon-Tiki is going to hit theaters on April 26th. The adventure film tells the story of Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl who (in real-life) crossed the Pacific ocean on a balsa wood raft in a voyage that took 101 days. The trailer is absolutely thrilling. It’s got dangerous sharks, sweeping camera shots and indefatigable optimism. Plus, you shouldn’t feel bad if you get a sense of Cast Away going on, because the beard Pål Sverre Hagen is sporting as Thor is pretty wicked. Check it out for yourself:...

The Weinstein Company has released a new trailer for directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg‘s adventure Kon-Tiki. It is based on the true story of Thor Heyerdahl, a Norwegian ethnographer who set sail on a 4,300-mile journey on a Kon-Tiki raft – from South America to Polynesia on a balsa wood raft in order to prove his theory that previous settlers followed the same journey. Norway’s Epic Oscar-Nominated adventure stars Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen, Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Gustaf Skarsgård, Odd Magnus Williamson, Tobias Santelmann, Jakob Oftebro, Agnes Kittelsen, and Eleanor Burke. Take a look at the trailer below and don’t forget to give us your thoughts in the...

Click to continue reading New Kon-tiki Trailer on | FilmoFilia

Related posts: Watch: New Trailer For Norway’s Oscar-Nominated Kon-tiki Norwegian Thesp Pal Hagen is Set the Lead Role for the Epic Kon-Tiki Norwegian Wood by Tran Anh Hung ‘The Oxford Murders...

Meet Kon-Tiki, the goergeous Norwegian epic that was filmed twice, in two different languages, and nominated for Best Foreign-Language Film at both the Oscars and Golden Globes. Already a box office smash in its native Norway, Kon-Tiki is a historical drama that follows adventurer and ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl as he sets out to prove that Polynesia was settled by peoples from Peru by re-creating the early South American explorers’ path by sea.

By creating a balsawood raft using ancient methods, Heyerdahl and a crew set off from the Peruvian coast in an attempt to catch ocean currents that will take them to the Polynesian islands in order to prove Heyerdahl’s theory of South American settlers. Heyderdahl (Norwegian star Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen), his five man crew and a macaw named Lolita are at the mercy of the Pacific as they attempt the 4,300 nautical mile journey on their homemade raft...

Kon-Tiki Trailer. Joachim Ronning, Espen Sandberg‘s Kon-Tiki (2012) movie trailer stars Pal Sverre Valheim Hagen, Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Gustaf Skarsgard, Tobias Santelmann, and Jakob Oftebro. Kon-Tiki‘s plot synopsis: “In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl embarks on an astonishing expedition – a journey of 4,300 nautical [...]

Continue reading: Kon-tiki (2012) Movie Trailer, Poster: Joachim Ronning, Espen Sandberg...

By the time the Oscars roll around, most of the major nominees have at least had a limited theatrical release and are known quantities to some extent. However, when it comes to the Best Foreign Film category, you can usually count on at least a few of the nominees being ripe for discovery, with the Oscars serving as their first real exposure to North American audiences. This year Kon-Tiki was one such movie, and although it couldn't beat Michael Haneke's Amour, the clips shown from the movie looked intriguing to say the least. The Weinstein Company will be distributing the movie stateside, and on Friday they released a domestic trailer to help build some buzz. It is based on the true story of Thor Heyerdahl, a Norwegian ethnographer who set sail from South America to Polynesia on a balsa wood raft in order to prove his theory that previous settlers followed the same journey.

Before We Saw the Trailer, We Thought: Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl may have conquered the Pacific Ocean on a tiny wooden raft in 1947 (and won an Academy Award for Best Documentary in 1950 for his exploits in the process), but this Sunday the first dramatic adaptation of his marvelous expedition seems poised to fall against a couple of helpless, ailing octogenarians, as Michael Haneke's "Amour" and Joachim Ronning and Espen Sandberg's "Kon-Tiki" go head to head in the Best Foreign Film category at the Oscars. Early buzz described the film in terms like "enjoyable" and "supersized," hinting at the Norwegian equivalent of high seas blockbuster fare. And Now? The Weinstein Company-backed "Kon-Tiki," starring Nordic Ryan Gosling doppleganger Pal Sverre Valheim Hagen as Heyerdahl, is notable in the nominated bunch for being the most expensive in-country produced film in Norwegian history. It shows, too, as you can see now...

The Weinstein Co. has set an April 19 release date for their Oscar-nominated Best Foreign Language contender Kon-Tiki and today released the first official domestic trailer for the Norwegian film from directors Joachim Ronning and Espen Sandberg. In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl embarks on an astonishing expedition - a journey of 4,300 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on the Kon-Tiki raft. From his days living in the Marquesas with his wife Liv, Thor suspected that the South Sea Islands had been settled by ancient South Americans from thousands of miles to the east. Despite his inability to swim and fear of water, Thor decides to prove his theory by sailing the legendary voyage himself. While Michael Haneke's Amour is going to win the Oscar, I have heard really good things about this film and am looking forward to giving it a watch.

Watch the trailer and browse the photo gallery for the Oscar-nominated Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg film starring Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen and Anders Baasmo Christiansen. Kon-Tiki opens in theaters on April 19th and contends for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year this weekend at the Academy Awards. The film was also a Golden Globe hominee and won the Audience Award at the Norwegian International Film Festival, as well as the Palm Springs International Film Festival's Director's To Watch Award for Rønning and Sandberg. Also in the cast are Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Gustaf Skarsgård, Odd Magnus Williamson, Tobias Santelmann, Jakob Oftebro and Agnes Kittelsen. In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl embarks on an astonishing expedition - a journey of 4,300 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on the Kon-Tiki raft. From his days living in the Marquesas with his wife Liv, Thor...

Watch the trailer and browse the photo gallery for the Oscar-nominated Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg film starring Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen and Anders Baasmo Christiansen. Kon-Tiki opens in theaters on April 19th and contends for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year this weekend at the Academy Awards. The film was also a Golden Globe hominee and won the Audience Award at the Norwegian International Film Festival, as well as the Palm Springs International Film Festival's Director's To Watch Award for Rønning and Sandberg. Also in the cast are Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Gustaf Skarsgård, Odd Magnus Williamson, Tobias Santelmann, Jakob Oftebro and Agnes Kittelsen. In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl embarks on an astonishing expedition - a journey of 4,300 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on the Kon-Tiki raft. From his days living in the Marquesas with his wife Liv, Thor...

The domestic trailer for Kon-Tiki has arrived and you can check it out in the player below, courtesy of Yahoo! Movies . Set for a limited release on April 19, Kon-Tiki is directed by Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg from a script by Petter Skavlan. Starring Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen, Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Gustaf Skarsgård, Jakob Oftebro, Odd Magnus Williamson, Tobias Santelmann and Agnes Kittelsen, the film is officially described as follows: In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl embarks on an astonishing expedition - a journey of 4,300 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on the Kon-Tiki raft. From his days living in the Marquesas with his wife Liv, Thor suspected that the South Sea Islands had been settled...

At first, it seems like this is an odd year for Best Documentary Feature. A lot of the early favorites weren’t nominated, and some of them didn’t even make the shortlist. I’m thinking of Central Park Five and Bully, and to an extent The House I Live In. However, in spite of how unexpected it feels, that almost always happens. If anything, this is a strange but predictable year for the category. We have a front-runner, even if the list appears to be diverse in content and full of impressively affecting films. Incidentally, watch the winner. This year’s fiction nominees include two films based on prior documentary Oscar-winners. Kon-Tiki in Best Foreign Language Film is based on the journey of Thor Heyerdahl to Polynesia, the documentary of which won in 1952. The Sessions, meanwhile, is based on Jessica Yu’s short doc winner Breathing Lessons. Could we see another Oscar-nominated adaptation from this list...

Tobias Santelmann, who stars as one of the brawny sailors on Thor Heyerdahl's raft in Norway's Oscar-nominated "Kon-Tiki," has been cast as Viking leader Asbjorn in "Northmen -- A Viking Saga." In the film, Asbjorn is stranded behind enemy lines on the coast of Alba with his Vikings. Their only hope for survival is to find a route to the Viking settlement Danelag, voyaging through hostile lands and fending off vicious mercenaries. The film will be helmed by Claudio Faeh ("Sniper: Reloaded") and is co-penned by Mattias Bauer and Bastian Zach. Santelmann can be seen in the above photo scooping a CG shark by its tail. Meanwhile, Iceland's Baltasar Kormakur, who directed the country's shortlisted Oscar entry "The Deep," is planning a Viking film of his own (our interview with more details on the project is here). Our Toh! review of "Kon-Tiki," which will be released by the Weinstein Co.

In January when the nominations were announced for the 85th Academy Awards, Norway’s Kon-tiki was recognized with a nod in the Best Foreign Language Film category and found itself in the company of Amour from Austria, War Witch from Canada, A Royal Affair from Denmark and No from Chile.

Go behind the scenes in this brand new featurette from The Weinstein Company. From directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg, Kon-tiki screened in September at the Toronto International Film Festival and is scheduled for an April 19th release.

In 1947, the world is gripped with excitement as the young Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl embarks on an astonishing expedition – a journey of 4,300 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on the Kon-Tiki raft. From his days living in the Marquesas with his wife Liv, Thor suspected that the South Sea Islands had been settled by ancient South Americans from thousands of miles to the east.

A nominee for Best Foreign Language Picture at this year’s Oscars, Norwegian import Kon-Tiki chronicles the journey of adventurer Thor Heyerdahl and his incredible journey some 5,000 miles across the Pacific Ocean from Peru to Polynesia on a balsa wood raft. Though comparisons will inevitably be drawn between this film and Ang Lee’s Life of Pi, a fellow Oscar nominee, they are very different beasts and are both films are deserving of attention.

If nothing else, Kon-Tiki (the name of the aforementioned vessel) adds to the impressive list of superb films from Scandinavia this past year. From Headhunters (one of my favourites of 2012) to the overlooked Snabba Cash (Easy Money), fare from this region has never been more accessible or memorable.

So now comes Kon-Tiki, the first Norwegian film to score both a nomination at the Golden Globe and Academy Award ceremonies, and it’s rather easy to see why.