(Tahoe) - Is "Lakeily" a word? If so, I would have preferred that to the more general "geographically" Perhaps in the UNCI, which I didn't know I had until today ( 125A: Hook-shaped parts of brains). And yet the word was in my brain somewhere. To me, THOLE is Thomething a Thinner might want to Thave.
87A: Gunwale pin (thole) - I barely know what "gunwale" is. 60D: Pester for payment (dun) - to me, "DUN" is a color. Listen, you stupid machine, I typed what I typed, give me my hits list!? I am trying to find an instance of its use, but Google keeps insisting that I must mean. 
82A: How photography books are usually printed (glossily) - that is one ballsy adverb. 61A: Deuce follower (ad in) - common answer, but that didn't keep me from wanting TREY. I know the cast, and yet never saw the movie. 29A: "Cinderella Man" co-star (Crowe) - I have trouble remembering this guy's name. 121A: Some collars and jackets ( ETons). 93A: Chopin's "Butterfly" or "Winter Wind" ( ETude). 37D: "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" director, 2007 (Lum ET). 21A: 1986 self-titled album whose cover was Andy Warhol's last work ("Ar ETha") - I thought this was the one with "Freeway of Love" on it, but that was "Who's Zoomin' Who?" "ARETHA" had the duet with George Michael, "I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)". Of all the rebus squares, I love E-TickET the most ( 74A: Modern traveler's purchase) Is "fine" an adjective? If something is "fine," it is triple-A? With two A's in place already, I figured the last letter had to be an A as well. I don't really understand the clue at 73A: Fine rating (AAA). HEGIRAS sounds only vaguely like a word I've heard before ( 46D: Long flights), and if I hadn't learned GOA from puzzles ( 57A: India's smallest state), that "G" could easily have been a "J" or even some other random letter. In other news, HEGIRAS / GOA / AAA would have destroyed me not much earlier in my solving career. 55D: Napoleon's place, frequented by 26-Across? (patisserie) - a "Napoleon" is a French pastry, but you knew that. 52D: Morning refreshment for 26-Across? (cafe au lait). 118A: Landmark inaugurated whose shape is suggested by nine squares in this puzzle's completed grid (Eiffel Tower). 67A: 1971 Oscar-winning film whose title is hinted at nine times in this grid ("The French Connection"). 45A: Wine enjoyed by 26-Across, maybe (Chateau Lafite). 26A: 1951 Oscar-winning film whose title suggests a visitor to the 118-Across ("An American in Paris"). The worst thing about this puzzle was the title - "Architectural Drawing"!? Zzzzzzzzzzz. Gorski constructed last year's Best Sunday puzzle of the year (James Bond/martini), and this puzzle more than lives up the high standards she set with that puzzle. The doubleness of "ET" is amazing, as is the architecture of the tower - the additional movies-exploding-into-random-Frenchness was less comprehensible, but sort of beautiful in its decadence - long lovely words describing rich drinks and comestibles. Just when I thought I had a handle on it, it morphed into something else. I found the whole thing really slippery, in that I never really knew what was supposed to be anchoring the puzzle, theme-wise. 
Even if you consider it a failure (I don't), at least it's a great big glorious failure and not a meek add-a-letter / bad pun failure.
It was a little maddening, but for the most part, I loved it. This is the craziest, most ambitious, scattered, manic, loopy, Everything-But-The-Kitchen-Sink puzzle I've ever solved.
also Hegira The flight of Muhammad from Mecca to Medina in 622 A.D., marking the beginning of the Muslim era. There's a big MINT PATTY in the middle of all this, but I don't think that has anything to do with the theme. #TO PESTER FOR PAYMENT MOVIE#
a rebus puzzle where the letters "ET" are crammed into nine different squares throughout the grid those letters are the initials of EIFFEL TOWER, which the rebus squares are arranged to look like (if you connect them together with a pen/pencil after you're done) "ET" also stands for the French word "AND," which is technically a "conjunction" but is referred to here as a FRENCH CONNECTION, which is a movie that has very little to do with France, but whatever another movie, "AN AMERICAN IN PARIS," provides the subject for the rest of the theme answers - we are supposed to imagine this hypothetical American (not the "American" of the movie proper) wandering around Paris consuming distinctly French things from the various wine, coffee, and pastry shops. THEME: "Architectural Drawing" - Let's see.
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