We're all just tiny pieces in this catastrophic stew!

January 18, 2022 8:36 AM

In 2008, the Norwegian city Hamar decided to build a diving tower. The estimated cost was 1.5 million krone (roughly $170k USD). Seven years and 28 million krone later, it was finally finished. Here is the story of the most expensive diving tower in the world, told half as documentary and half as absurdist musical. [SL DailyMotion, subtitles available in English]

Part of Stories from Norway, a documentary-cum-musical series by Ylvis, of "What Does the Fox Say?" fame. Other episodes cover such fascinating local subjects as Justin Bieber temper tantrums, nuclear oopsies with the Russian military, and the time Edvard Munch's "The Scream" was stolen during the 1994 Winter Olympics.

posted by rorgy (7 comments total)

Any place to find the rest of the series? Looks the the Bieber one and the one on Munch are on YouTube, but I can't find a single source. They were apparently streamed in Australia on SBS, but that's not available in the US.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 10:36 AM on January 18, 2022

That was hilarious and ultimately kind of a sweet story. I mean, can you imagine that kind of ending happening in a small town in the US now-a-days?
posted by gwint at 10:40 AM on January 18, 2022

How do you activate the subs?
posted by BrStekker at 11:00 AM on January 18, 2022

BrStekker, took me awhile, but they're hidden under the menu within the video activated from the top right hand side.

I kind of hate musicals but this was very enjoyable.
posted by maxwelton at 11:02 AM on January 18, 2022

Any place to find the rest of the series?

The account that posted the video in the post appears to have the whole series! I haven't given it a look, though.
posted by rorgy at 12:36 PM on January 18, 2022

I love it!

(but secretly, I was hoping that they would find out at the very end that the water was only 1m deep under the board)
posted by flyingfox at 1:19 PM on January 18, 2022

This was great, especially as someone who has been involved with and adjacent to civic government in different roles. It rang so true in so many directions and was super well put together. I think it says something positive about the Norwegian political atmosphere that everybody seemed happy to be interviewed years later for a comedy show about this project, boondoggle though it was.
posted by Superilla at 10:20 AM on January 19, 2022 [1 favorite]