Inquisitor 1764: Henry by Karla

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Karla makes his second appearance as an Inquisitor setter, the first one being last January in the set of 4 newbies.
 
Preamble: In each of 16 clues there is a misprint in the definition. The misprints in clue number order give part of a quote that can be completed by twice using one of the three unclued thematic entries. Solvers must identify an appropriate 3-letter item to rise within the grid, filling three initially blank contiguous cells, leaving real words, and leaving the original site empty. To demonstrate they have identified the scene now represented, solvers must highlight an object that is attached to the graphic in the isolated cell and then draw two lines from the risen object converging onto the graphic and continue these lines from the graphic to pinpoint a titular object that must also be highlighted.

I expected this to be tough since I’d found 3 of the last 4 puzzles rather on the easy side. First thing to note, we need to track the misprints rather than the corrections; secondly, we need to read them in clue number order so those from the across & down clues are going to be interleaved. OK, let’s crack on.

Almost straightaway I noticed there was no clue for 11a; a quick check of 11d revealed the answer was 7 letters, but 8 spaces. Ah, the three initially blank contiguous cells must be at the start of row 2, confirmed by 2d & 3d having answers that were one letter shorter than the space available. Things sped along, and I reckon that I solved about half the clues on the first run through. So this wasn’t the tough puzzle I’d been expecting.

I didn’t pay that much attention to the corrections until I’d solved all, or nearly all, the clues. One unclued entry was probably FEDORA and another BULLWHIP; for the third, SNAKES seemed most likely. So I unscrambled the corrections and the partial quote read “WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE”. Google helped me to “SNAKES. WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE SNAKES?”, spoken by Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark. (Never seen.) The poster for the film on Wikipedia shows the lead man wearing a fedora and wielding a bullwhip.

OK. Back to the grid to look for the appropriate 3-letter item to rise within the grid. Scanning the rows, looking at the start of each one, we arrive at 32a: SOLDADO, which leaves real words down below as the sun rises and makes real words up above once it has riz. Job done … or should I say half done, as identifying the scene now represented and finding the relevant clip from the movie for you all took me longer than the grid-fill.

It was easy enough to draw two lines from the risen object converging onto the graphic, the latter being attached to STAFF, later augmented to STAFF OF RA. But where next? The straight continuation led to somewhere outside the grid! After a bit of head-scratching I see that the titular object must be the ARK in the bottom right-hand corner and I put the kink down to artistic licence rather than refraction.

So that’s it, apart from mentioning that “Indy”’s full name is Dr Henry Walton “Indiana” Jones, Jr. Thanks Karla, neatly done – but it was a pity that for me there was such an imbalance between the grid-fill and the endgame; and you do seem to have a film theme developing after #1735 Gold. (Ill-advised of me to extrapolate from just two observations, I know.) Here’s the relevant clip from the movie; it’s not long – just over 4 minutes – but if you don’t want to watch the whole thing then jump to about 3:30 in.
 

No. Clue ✓[✗] ✗ Answer Wordplay
Across
1 Charlie enthusiastic about retaining Spain’s historical treaty (8)   ASSIENTO ASS (Charlie) INTO (enthusiastic about) around E (Spain)
7 Six-footers skipping popular classes (5)   SECTS INSECTS (six-footers) ¬ IN (popular)
12 Weight of Chinese duck with twisted innards (4)   TAEL TEAL (duck) with E↔A (inner letters swapped)
14 Worker periodically gets a card for vent[d]ing (8) D WREAKING W(o)R(k)E(r) A KING (card)
15 Male[i] name of sacred Greek mountain in article (5) I AIDAN IDA (sacred Greek mountain) in AN (article)
16 V[T]erse writers eviscerate slick artful debuts in series (6) T SKALDS S(lic)K A(rtfu)L D(ebut)S
17 Watch favourite rolling in tents[h] (6) H TEPEES SEE (watch) PET (favourite) all<
19 O[A]dd limitless beers and pies (5) A EERIE (b)EER(s) (p)IE(s)
20 Makes speeches with Sartre and Poe drunk together (9)   PERORATES [SARTRE POE]*
21 Unacceptable backtracking of guild essentially overlooked (4)   NON-U UN(i)ON< (guild)
22 Hirst artfully frames a goddess (6)   ISHTAR [HIRST]* around A
24 Mo[e]an daggers unsheathed in middle of aisles (6) E SNIVEL (k)NIVE(s) in (ai)SL(es)
25 Sleep[t]s in cycling break (4) T NAPS SNAP (break) with letters cycled
26 Moderate regularly between sons: nightmare! (9)   SOFT-SHELL OFT (regularly) between S+S (sons) HELL (nightmare)
29 In the past, dear sat by eastern embankment (5)   LEVEE LEVE (dear, archaic) E(astern)
32 Fighter disposed of with difficulty (7)   SOLDADO SOLD (disposed of) ADO (difficulty)
34 Methuselah’s old man Brian maybe with children (5)   ENOCH ENO (Brian maybe {British musician}) CH(children)
35 One’s attachments in police file voluntarily returned (8, 2 words)   LOVE LIFE (polic)E FILE VOL(untarily) <
36 Chromatically captures those sometimes on the road (4)   ROMA (ch)ROMA(tically)
37 Pastrycook expected comments initially about penny-bun (3)   CEP P(astrycook) E(xpected) C(omments) <
38 Chance husband secures right place on bo[e]at to rest (5) E BERTH BET (chance) H(usband) around R(ight)
39 Mug Ray makes needs resetting (8, 2 words)   EASY MARK [RAY MAKES]*
Down
2 Two notes underpinning second beat once (5)   SMITE MI+TE (two notes) after S(econd)
3 One with a position in debate on God’s given up (5)   SIDER RE (on) DIS (god) all<
4 M[W]ake from vessel pronounced (4) W EARN homophone URN (vessel)
5 Annual event replanting yew in Close (7, 2 words)   NEW YEAR [YEW]* in NEAR (close)
6 F[H]at Award ends in milliners’ strike (5) H OBESE OBE (award) (milliner)S (strik)E
8 Thousands occupying local river carriage (4)   EKKA K+K (thousands) in EA (river, dialect)
9 Youngster mostly on isle gets Hot[y] food (5) Y CHILI CHIL(d) (youngster) I(sle)
10 Sole[d] accessories, say, aboard steamer (4) D SEGS EG (say) in SS (steamer)
11 European on northern meadow drinking (7)   LAPPING LAPP (European) ING (meadow, dialect, esp N Eng)
12 They might contain Leave[i]s raving at poets (7) I TEAPOTS [AT POETS]*
13 Make resins with this in valley (6)   INDENE IN DENE (valley)
18 County cut those on the payroll (5)   STAFF STAFF(s) (county)
21 Jap[v]anese painting style no good in Hanoi, silly (7) V NIHONGA NG (no good) in [HANOI]*
23 Partners eating vegetable in an Indian bar (6)   SALOON S+N (south + north, partners) around ALOO (potato, Ind cookery)
24 Sound equipment damaged tree in Help! (7)   STEREOS [TREE]* in SOS (help)
26 Using other hand, put into Google ‘marine mammal’ for Jock (6)   SEALCH SEARCH (put into Google) with L(eft) for R(ight)
27 Symphony’s steamy passages lacking heart (6)   EROICA ERO(t)ICA (steamy passages)
28 Varnish boat including roof of cabin (6)   LACKER LAKER (boat) around C(abin)
30 The King is being usurped by royal water-dweller (5)   ELVER ELVIS (the King) with IS replaced by ER (royal)
31 Magistrate to omit section in recess (5)   EDILE SEDILE (recess) ¬ S(ection)
{more a seat in a niche than the niche itself}
32 Sail with sailor to deliver table for PM? (4)   SLAB S’L (sail) AB (sailor)
33 Cle[o]ver from earthenware left discarded (4) O DEFT DELFT (earthenware) ¬ L(eft)
34 Space above setter’s award for work on TV[B] (4) B EMMY EM (space) MY (setter’s)
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16 comments on “Inquisitor 1764: Henry by Karla”

  1. An enjoyable puzzle on the subject of a great film. I suspected that I’d messed up the endgame, which proves to be the case. I failed to spot “OF RA”, and took the risen object to be the STAFF, despite thinking that it would have been more logical for the sun to shine onto the “graphic” and then the ARK. Oh well. My excuse is that, in common with a character from an infamous scene in the film, I was also literally melting in the middle of the heatwave.

  2. I didn’t solve this at the time unfortunately, but my word that’s a brilliant final grid. Such a good idea and very well executed. Fantastic.

  4. I enjoyed solving this none-too-easy crossword, and it was satisfying to complete the grid, collecting all 16 letters as I did so. I got into a bit of difficulty in the top left before I realised that the 3-letter space was there, and there were some difficult clues like EDILE, where there was an obscure word as the answer as well as in the build-up (SEDILE).

    I filled in the three unclued entries and identified the 3-letter item that had to ‘rise’, but I had to look up the subject to learn more about the theme. I found, and highlighted, both the Staff of Ra and the Ark, but I had to guess how to ‘draw’ and ‘continue’ the lines from SOL to ARK via the graphic. I don’t know what the graphic represents, but I put the kink in the lines down to refraction (and not ‘artistic licence’!).

    I too identified Henry as Indiana. (Incidentally, removing SOL fro SOLDAD leaves DAD, and in a later film Henry is the name of Indiana’s Dad.)

    Thanks to Karla for the puzzle and to HolyGhost for the blog.

  5. Enjoyed as usual — all thanks to Karla and HolyGhost. It’s one of those films I’ve never seen but sort of know about by cultural osmosis. The rising SOL was easy enough and I guessed the theme from the unclued entries, but like HG had a slight conceptual difficulty with the “refraction” that pinpointed the ARK. Never mind. This was good fun.

  6. Best. Inquisitor. Ever.

    In my humble opinion anyway, but that’s because I grew up with the Indiana Jones movies. Like HG, the endgame took a while to unravel (it could perhaps have been explained slightly more clearly), but once I found the ARK it became obvious, and the end product is a thing of beauty.

    TonyG @3 I believe PM in this instance is short for post mortem.

  7. Hmm. Solved and found the theme and the Sol rising, but missed the Staff of Ra and the probable refraction leading to the Ark. Ah well.

  8. If, lazily, you had stopped at the fact that the symmetrically placed ‘cep’, rising, creates real words (though not leaving them when vacated, admittedly), you might then hesitate, as I did, to do the research connecting Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Staff of Ra with a rising mushroom. Which may be why I never noticed the ark.

    Excellent blog and puzzle, thanks to Karla and HG.

  9. A very enjoyable puzzle I thought with a very clever and nicely executed endgame. I too was a bit confused by the refraction of the light onto ark, and watching the clip of the relevant scene the light doesn’t seem to bend. But that’s being petty: it was great fun.
    Thanks Karla for the puzzle and HolyGhost for the comprehensive blog.

  13. A really good puzzle, thank you Karla.

    I failed to spot the ARK at the bottom of the grid and instead continued my lines straight through the O to the ARK in a triangular formation using the K in SNAKES.

  14. I enjoyed this. I saw all the Indiana Jones movies with the kids when they were young so the theme was familiar. I spotted what was going on when the grid was about half full. Until the PDM the solve had been slow-going, after that it was a romp to the finish.

    Thank you Karla and HG.

  15. Thanks to HG and all those who have contributed here. I watched this in lockdown and was struck with firstly how well it has dated and secondly just how good it is (none of the sequels comes close IMHO). I wanted to get a face-melting device in there but thought it might be a bit too much (it certainly was when I saw that scene as a youngster for the first time and it’s lost none of it’s potency). The sequel to this will not be filmic.

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