All of this may undermine Kon-Tiki's value as an educational tool, but there's no denying its status as a rousing and thoroughly enjoyable Old Hollywood-style adventure. Little time is wasted on exposition; the filmmakers efficiently use a brief prologue on an icy Norwegian pond to establish Heyerdahl's status as an innate adventurer before rushing through his fundraising difficulties in order to get to the meat of the story: six men and a parrot facing death and despair on the high seas.
To their credit, the filmmakers do attempt to dig a little deeper than just that, trying to convey the righteous obsession and complicated motivations of the explorer. Heyerdahl eventually finds his funding after appealing to the vanity of the Peruvian president, and the film exhibits an ongoing interest in explorers driven by quests both noble (for knowledge) and vain (for immortality). Heyerdahl himself is spurred on by a near-religious faith in the guessed-at methods of the ancient mariners, which that first-mate character writes off as an insane obsession.
The more meaningful character explorations never quite coalesce, alas, mostly because the filmmakers are more interested in — and far more skilled at — the high-tension thrills they're manufacturing. It's difficult to blame them, given that their take on the trip is probably far more entertaining than a more realistic one. As one magazine publisher, reluctant to engage in what he sees as sensationalism, tells Heyerdahl, "Doubtless the story of Norwegians drowning in the Pacific will sell a lot of magazines." What's true for magazines is also true for movie tickets.