[maybecorrect]

It is a function - print() is being called as a function, taking a number of positional, arguments followed by named argument. I don't think you're correct about this being special syntax, except for the '*' is being used to expand a list into the positional arguments.

[mclehman]

I believe they meant replacing the special * syntax with a use of apply so that there was no special syntax to achieve that functionality at all.