STRANGE DAYS
1995 Movie starring Ralph Fiennes - the Wiki
I was attempting to find another movie/TV show with seconds, days, weeks or months in the title, and some obvious ones came to mind - e.g., 9-1/2 weeks, Gone in Sixty Seconds, but I wanted to keep with the "half of the theme answer" concept. I liked Strange Days, saw it when it came out 30 years ago. Mr. Vu is a prolific constructor with several LA Times puzzles alone. Today we have no circles, 24 4LWs, and very few names, but I still got done in by one - see the red square in the solution at the bottom - all in a standard 15 x 15 grid. The themers;
20. Olsen twins teen comedy set in the Big Apple: NEW YORK MINUTE - The reveal is "half" of the themer, and New York is "one" thing, but it is "two" words, IMHO. Just sayin'.
35. Jackie Chan/Chris Tucker buddy cop film with two sequels: RUSH HOUR - I have sat through a couple of these movies; Jackie Chan is just amazing, did most of his own stunts; Chris Tucker is just annoying.
42. Amy Adams rom-com about a February 29 tradition: LEAP YEAR - I know nothing about this one, so here's the IMDb
58. Highlights of many bowl games, and an apt description of 20-, 35-, and 42-Across?: HALF-TIME SHOWS - Here is the Wiki on all the halftime performances at the Super Bowl; none of these artists made me want to sit through what was most likely a lip-sync show; I DO know that C.C. was probably most pleased 10 years ago when Bruno Mars was the headliner; and let us not forget the "wardrobe malfunction" 20 years ago . . . .half-time is a rhythmic feel with the beat on 2 and 4; if you want to be more confused, check this drummer's YouTube video. Here's a song with the half-time feel at the end of the chorus;
The Bee Gees - Stayin' Alive - twice in one week~!
ACROSS:
1. Random __ of kindness: ACTS
5. Range for a yodeler: ALPS - not fooled by the mountain range vs. pitch range
9. Instrument in Hindi cinema: SITAR - I like the "sitar-style" solo in the song below - there's a less "sitar-ish" solo in the live performance on YouTube; the only reason I bring it up is that the show aired on my 2nd Birthday - 52 years and three days ago
Steely Dan - Do It Again
My short-lived marriage started with a Medieval Wedding
16. Start with a clean slate?: ERASE
17. Omnia vincit __: AMOR - Love Conquers All - Latin
18. Morose: DOUR
19. Solemn recitations: OATHS
23. Wrath: IRE - AND - 10D. Apoplectic: IRATE - FLW: Lucina, I cashed in my "trial" IRA that I never actually funded - its net worth dropped since it was opened, down to a mere $696. The one I have with the Pipe Organ company has a 5% match, so that's rocking right now. And I feel your pain - my mother's bank accounts are proving to be a nightmare to close because they, too, changed ownership right when she died, and NYS is now requiring I "prove" how I distributed the money - why~? What if I said I built a deck with the money~? Will they deny me this last account~? Feel my IRE, I am IRATE
25. Some phone notifications: ALERTS
28. Common part of a lunch combo: SALAD - I usually get the SOUP
30. Inca Trail to Machu Picchu locale: PERU - I did not see the word "locale" when I was solving the puzzle, so I thought we were looking for the NAME of the trail|
South America - I could go for a tour of the place
32. Cal. column: THUrsday
33. Grab a chair: SIT
38. Ice hockey gear: SKATES
41. Absolute gems: BEAUTS
44. Syst. in which "A" is a closed fist: ASL - American Sign Language
46. Has a debt: OWES
48. Hard __ to break: HABIT - Also the title of this Chicago song
Smoking, drinking and sexual overtones; ah, the 80's
55. Attention to detail: CARE
57. Single: ONE
61. Animal also called the zebra giraffe: OKAPI
63. Resting on: ATOP
64. Word said while pointing: THAT 👈
65. Concur: AGREE
66. Astronauts' org.: NASA
67. Additional: MORE
68. "Fun, Fun, Fun" car: T-BIRD - The Beach Boys are not normally my musical thing, but I listened and it's "Chuck Berry blues" - the link here - and anything guitar I can learn from is a good thing; I like the Ford Thunderbird - I had one just like the picture, ridiculously quick, but had to let it go because it had some bizarre Teves Swedish ABS system that failed, $1400 plus labor to replace 😟
1986 Ford Thunderbird Turbo Coupe; I paid $1200 for it in 1998
Tenerife, Canary Islands, 1977 - most fatal airplane accident - Air Disasters
DOWN:
1. "Jagged Little Pill" singer Morissette: ALANIS - this being her third album, it was a huge success, including the single "You Outta Know" - NSFW
2. Kodak innovation: CAMERA - I was today years old when I learned that Kodak is not Polaroid
3. Garden tool: TROWEL - for those 'heavy makeup days'
4. Agile: SPRY
5. "The United States vs. Billie Holiday" Oscar nominee Day: ANDRA - my last crossing, as one can see in the solution below - I had an "E" for the last letter, not knowing who Andra Day is - the WIki
7. Expert at handling snakes?: PLUMBER - ah, yes, the plumber's snake
9. South Korean capital: SEOUL - twice this week
11. Curly fry alternative: TATER TOT
12. Some barbecue remains: ASH
13. Low-__: RES - we had "Hi _" on Monday
21. Quirky thing: ODDITY
22. Queasy feeling: NAUSEA - Quirky & Queasy - but no Q in the fill . . . .
And now there is~! Star Trek: TNG
27. __ La Table: cookware retailer: SUR - I have never shopped here
29. "Now!" letters: ASAP - here we go; NOW means STAT, not "as soon as possible"
31. Massage: RUB
34. Begin a round of golf: TEE OFF - also the polite way to say one is "irate"
36. Figures (out): HASHES - I tried SUSSES - that's 50% correct
37. Polynesian dance: HULA
38. MacFarlane of "Family Guy": SETH - I happen to like his creations, not just Family Guy and American Dad~!, but his Star Trek homage "The Orville" was a great show, too
39. Desert that covers much of Botswana: KALAHARI
42. Murphy's __: LAW - rhyming sequential answers
43. Solo performance: RECITAL
47. Appetizer before a curry, maybe: SAMOSA - filled via perps; a recipe here
49. "Cry me a river!": "BOO-HOO~!"
50. To the middle: INWARD
51. Proctor's charge: TESTEE - 😝 a test taker
53. Dwindle (down): TAPER
54. "OK, that was untrue": "I LIED."
56. Settle a debt: REPAY
59. Basks in the sun: TANS - does an iguana "tan"~?
60. Webpage medium: HTML - filled via perps; HyperText Markup Language
61. Muesli morsel: OAT
62. Old CIA foe: KGB - The new Russian intelligence agencies are here
Thank you all for the B-day comments~!
Splynter
8 comments:
In some ways, this was not an easy puzzle. (I never heard of “LARP,” for instance.) But the themers were easy to figure out, even if you had never heard of the films (“Rush Hour” was the only one that immediately came to mind.) Anyway, FIR, so I’m happy.
Good rainy morning!
Good thing I didn't notice LARP -- would've felt obligated to change something. Hand up for suSsES, too (Hi, Splynter). No, today wasn't a Wite-Out-free exercise. I agree that NEW YORK MINUTE is an outlier -- 7-letters vs 6 -- not exactly half. Enjoyed it, though. Thanx, Vu (is that your first name?) and Splynter. (Methinks Otto-correct changed your "oughta" to "outta.")
Otto-correct got me, too, changing "obliged" to "obligated."
FIR, but erased tue for THU and also for MORE. Guessed correctly at OKAPI x KALAHARI. Had to be A, I or O, thought I. I knew the critter, just not how to spel it.
I also thought of the Chicago classic Hard Habit to Break.
I've heard of SLAY for a comedian's successful appearance, but not a model's.
I always thought that a urologist was in charge of TESTEES, not a proctologist. Oh, proctor - never mind.
Funny how PAY and REPAY mean the same thing.
Is HTML a medium? Isn't that like saying that COBOL is a medium? What say you, Corner softheads?
Thanks (I think) to Vu for the easy-enough midweek puzzle. I'm not into movies or celebrities, which dampened the fun a bit. And thanks to Splynter for another fine review.
FIR. Except for larp (?), which I'd never ever heard of, and Andra Day, another unknown, this was a mostly easy puzzle for a Wednesday.
The theme seems a bit of a stretch, but it fortunately wasn't needed for the solve.
So overall a mostly enjoyable puzzle.
Took 4 minutes and 54 seconds today.
I didn't know today's actress (Andra), larp, or today's Latin lesson.
I agree with the prior comments in that this seemed too easy for a Wednesday and the theme was ... meh, which is generally how I feel about themed puzzles.
Good Morning:
Other than Larp and Andra, this was an easy and quick solve. The fill-in-the-blank clues and the conversational phrases tend too interrupt the flow of a smooth solve, IMO, but both seem ingrained in current construction trends. The theme was easy to see and the reveal was timely, if not surprising.
Thanks, Hoang-Kim or Vu, whichever is correct, and thanks, Splynter, for the concise and informative review. Any updates on the canine quest?
Have a great day.
To, not too. Autocorrect is on a tear this morning!
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