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FOR RENT

ACROSS
1 Lighthouse
emission
5 Routine material
10 Mystery novelist
Paretsky
14 “Sesame Street”
giggler
15 How cut-up raw
veggies are often
served
17 “Bridge of Spies”
spy Rudolf __
18 “Casablanca”
actor
19 Deliberately
damage
21 Some running
shoes
22 Made oneself
scarce
23 Bingo-like game
24 Smoke from
Cuba
30 Euro pop?
31 Go from pillar to
post
32 Gaza Strip gp.
35 Milk
40 Classified
postings
41 Word with hall or
house
42 __ pricing
43 Some Downton
Abbey staff
47 38th-parallel land
50 Many millennia
51 Just enough to
taste, with “of”
52 Starting at 19-
Across and
ending here,
vehicle making
its way through
five long answers
58 Expressed with
only gestures
60 Greasy
61 Walk-in
emergency
center
62 Mess setting
63 Zap with a
weapon
64 Like giraffes and
horses
65 Token receiver

DOWN
1 Young Cleaver,
for short

2 Idris of “Luther”
3 Service call?
4 Penicillin source
5 She sang about
McGee
6 Iroquois tribe
7 Willy or Lenny of
Manhattan deli
fame
8 Pentathlon sword
9 35mm camera
type
10 Russell __
Candies
11 Heart chambers
12 Played over
13 “You __ cool!”
16 Selma’s state
20 “So that’s the
puzzle theme!”
24 Torso topper
25 Torah chests
26 One of a
vivacious pair?
27 Origami bird
28 Discontinued
Saturn model
29 Noir weapon
30 School support
org.
32 Cooped (up)
33 Co-worker of
Clark

34 “The good is __
interred with their
bones”: Antony
36 Stuffed one’s face
37 Throw on
38 Jettas, e.g.
39 Rev
43 Protégé
44 Midnight rider
45 Like a ripped-up
check
46 Taylor of fashion
47 On the blink

48 Maureen of “The
Quiet Man”
49 Wedding bands
52 Layered mineral
53 Arabian Sea
sultanate
54 Loads
55 Vaccine holder
56 “Not only 
that ... ”
57 Politburo no
59 “Newhart”
production co.

By Ed Sessa
©2018 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
01/03/18

01/03/18

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

RELEASE DATE– Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

xwordeditor@aol.com

6A — Wednesday, January 3, 2018
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

“Jumanji: 
Welcome 
to 

the Jungle” functions as a 
“legacy-quel” (a term coined 
to describe the recent trend in 
movies to release sequels after 
their original audience has 
had time to grow up and have 
little audience members of 
their own) to Robin Williams’s 
(“The Birdcage”) flick released 
22 years ago. In this updated 
version, instead of the titular 
board 
game 
bringing 
all 

sorts of jungle creatures into 
modern-day 
suburbia, 
four 

high schoolers are sucked into 
a virtual world, given different 
avatars to control and told that 
they must save the world in 
order to return home.

The 
crux 
of 
the 
film’s 

marketing was the idea of 
watching the stars of the 

movie playing against type 
in a particularly egregious 
way. Dwayne Johnson (“The 
Fate of the Furious”) plays the 
avatar of a nerd who’s afraid 
of 
everything. 
Kevin 
Hart 

(“Central 
Intelligence”) 
is 

the jock who pays Johnson’s 
“real life” character to do 
his 
homework. 
Jack 
Black 

(“Goosebumps”) 
is 
every 

teenage girl stereotype the 
writers could cram into a 
single character. The problem 
isn’t that there are no laughs 
to be mined from this. The 

conflict between a person’s 
outward appearance and who 
they actually are is some of 
the oldest joke material in the 
book. No, the problem is that 
after the first scene with the 
avatars, the shtick wears real 
thin real fast.

After that first scene, it 

becomes painfully obvious that 
no one involved, especially the 
writers, has any idea what to do 
with “Welcome to the Jungle” 
beyond repeating those same 

jokes ad nauseum. By the time 
Jack Black gets an overlong and 
embarrassingly 
extraneous 

scene in which he is taught by 
Johnson and Hart how to use 
his new penis — a sentence 
that, God help me, I can never 
unwrite — they’ve graduated 
from the shallow likeability 
they showed at first into a 
groanworthy monotony.

Not only does using this 

conflict as the cornerstone of 
the film hurt the comedy, it 
makes it all but impossible for 
any of the players to develop. 
The high schoolers are entirely 
defined 
through 
contrast 

with their avatars rather than 
through any growth of their 
own. Take Johnson’s character, 
Spencer, for instance. From 
the very beginning, everything 
about Spencer is in service to 
enforcing the idea that he is not 
a character The Rock would 
usually play. These characters 
are usually fearless, so Spencer 
is afraid of everything. They 
aren’t 
usually 
nerdy 
and 

socially awkward, so Spencer 
is both. There isn’t a single 
aspect of his personality that 
can’t adequately be summed up 
as not “The Rock,” and when 
a character is defined by what 
they aren’t as opposed to what 
they are, that doesn’t make 
for 
interesting 
storytelling. 

The actors all turn in fine 

performances, but they aren’t 
given much to do besides 
taking 
what 
they 
would 

ordinarily do and just doing 
the opposite.

Aside from that, there was 

a chance for “Welcome to the 
Jungle” to satirize gaming 
culture, 
as 
winked 
at 
by 

Karen Gillan (“Guardians of 
the Galaxy Vol. 2”), pointing 
out 
the 
absurdity 
of 
her 

avatar wearing a halter top 
in the middle of a jungle. 
Unfortunately, not only does 
the script completely abandon 
this idea after that first aside in 
favor of action scenes that make 
the sexualization of Wonder 
Woman in “Justice League” 
look subtle by comparison, but 
most of the movie plays like 
it was written by a 40-year-
old man who hasn’t touched a 
video game since 1996. What 
little dialogue isn’t taken up by 
repetitive jokes is filled with 
clunky exposition about video 
games that feels like someone 
opened the Wikipedia page 
for “video gaming” and just 
started copying paragraphs.

This lack of self-awareness 

and dated dialogue might be 
forgivable, but it’s compounded 
by the dearth of good humor, 
and almost any reason to see 
“Welcome 
to 
the 
Jungle” 

completely 
collapses 
under 

that weight. The only thing 
left is the simple nostalgia of 
seeing the original reimagined 
— references include a well-
intentioned 
reference 
to 

Robin 
Williams’s 
character 

that makes little sense and 
Bobby 
Cannavale 
(“Ant-

Man”) chewing scenery in the 
part originated by Jonathan 
Hyde (“Titanic”) — and that 
nostalgia, as in all legacy-quels, 

JEREMIAH VANDERHELM

Daily Arts Writer

‘Jumanji’ sequel fails despite good cast and performances

‘Welcome to the Jungle’ 
can’t match the original

When you hear moviegoers 

use the phrase “so bad it’s 
good,” your mind likely goes to 
Tommy Wiseau’s “The Room,” 
or perhaps to even more recent 
offerings such as “Sharknado” 
or “Birdemic: Shock and Terror.” 
With the recent release of “The 
Disaster 
Artist,” 
a 
comedic 

biopic about the making of “The 
Room” 
from 
actor/director 

James Franco (“The Vault”), the 
discussion 
surrounding 
films 

that are so bad they’re good has 
been renewed. However, the 
advent of the anti-masterpiece 
began 
long 
before 
Tommy 

Wiseau ever uttered the phrase, 
“Oh, hi Mark.” Rather, those 
examining the history of bad 
film should look to one Edward 
D. Wood Jr., the mind behind 
B-movie flops such as “Bride of 
the Monster” and “Plan 9 from 
Outer Space.”

In the 1994 film “Ed Wood,” 

director Tim Burton (“Miss 
Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar 
Children”) 
pays 
homage 
to 

Wood, posthumously awarded 
as The Worst Director of All 
Time. Starring Johnny Depp 
(“Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead 
Men Tell No Tales”) as Ed Wood, 
the movie focuses on several 
aspects of the director’s life: His 
transvestitism, his film career 
and his friendship with actor 
Bela Lugosi.

Interestingly, the film never 

sets out to make fun of Wood 
but to celebrate his life and his 
uncompromising dedication to 
his dream. Over the course of 
the film, audiences see Wood do 
whatever it takes to film his next 
scene, whether that be begging 
for the attention of rich backers 
or convincing all of his friends 

to get baptised by a church in 
order to fund his movie. Depp’s 
charm makes Wood the ultimate 
underdog; as he stands behind 
the camera mouthing along to 
lines he wrote, pantomiming 
the facial expressions of his 
characters, Wood’s unbridled 
enthusiasm becomes contagious.

It’s this very contagiousness 

that sits at the center of the film’s 
message; for all his eccentricity 

and incompetence, Wood is 
never alone. He attracts an 
unwaveringly 
loyal 
band 
of 

Hollywood misfits from the once-
great actor Bela Lugosi (Martin 
Landau, “Abe & Phil’s Last Poker 
Game”) to Tor Johnson (George 
Steele, “Boston Girls”), a hulking 
Swedish wrestler. Never mind 
his ineptitude, never mind his 
penchant 
for 
crossdressing 

during 
the 
puritanical 
and 

straight-laced 
1950s, 
Wood’s 

magnetism and vision make 

him beloved by an ensemble 
of characters who don’t just 
tolerate his eccentricity but 
embrace it.

It’s in this way that Wood 

redefines “the artist’s struggle.” 
It’s 
not 
just 
the 
monetary 

struggle of the underappreciated 
artist, it’s also the struggle to 
stay true to oneself. This is 
poignantly depicted in a scene 
where a frustrated Wood storms 
off set and hops in a cab to the 
nearest bar. Upon arriving, he’s 
surprised to see his inspiration 
and idol Orson Welles sitting in 
a booth. Dressed head to toe in 
women’s clothing, he approaches 
Welles and the two converse as 
equals. There’s a certain coat of 
irony that comes in successful 
mega-stars playing struggling 
artists, but it melts away in this 
scene as we see the lauded Welles 
speak to Wood as if they were old 
friends. These artists, for all the 
disparity that may be present in 
the quality of their work, bond 
over common experiences. It’s 
here that the true message of “Ed 
Wood” reveals itself: The quality 
of your work isn’t as important 
as staying true to your vision.

It’s an important message, 

and one that likely answers the 
question of why we gravitate 
towards films like “Plan 9 from 
Outer Space” and “The Room.” 
Both Wood and Wiseau were 
men whose mediocrity at their 
craft played itself out with such 
passionate truthfulness that the 
result is irresistibly magnetic. 
Through all the raw, unbridled 
passion these artists hold, we 
can sense an uncompromising 
dedication to a dream. As Orson 
Welles says to Wood when the 
two directors depart: “Visions 
are worth fighting for. Why 
spend your life making someone 
else’s dream?”

From the Vault: ‘Ed Wood’

“Jumanji: 

Welcome to the 

Jungle”

Ann Arbor 20 + 
IMAX, Goodrich 

Quality 16

Sony Pictures 
Entertainment

After that first 

scene, it becomes 

painfully 

obvious that no 
one involved, 
especially the 
writers, has any 
idea what to do 

with ‘Welcome to 

the Jungle’ 

What little 

dialogue isn’t 
taken up by 

repetitive jokes is 
filled with clunky 
exposition about 

video games

MAX MICHALSKY

Daily Arts Writer

FILM NOTEBOOK

Max Michalsky thinks about ‘The Disaster Artist,’ and 
why we love terrible movies despite their obvious flaws

Interestingly, 
the film never 
sets out to make 

fun of Wood 

but to celebrate 
his life and his 

uncompromising 
dedication to his 

dream

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