The Absent Minded Professor

Plot synopsis:
Professor Brainard (Fred MacMurray) (pronounced BRAY-nard) is an absent-minded professor of physical chemistry at Medfield College who invents a substance that gains energy when it strikes a hard surface. This discovery follows some blackboard scribbling in which he reverses a sign in the equation for enthalpy to energy plus pressure times volume. Brainard names his discovery Flubber, which is a portmanteau of "flying rubber." In the excitement of his discovery, he misses his own wedding to Betsy Carlisle (Nancy Olson), not for the first time, but his third. Subplots include another professor wooing the disappointed Miss Carlisle, Biff Hawk's (Tommy Kirk) ineligibility for basketball due to failing Brainard's class, Alonzo Hawk's (Keenan Wynn) schemes to gain wealth by means of Flubber, the school's financial difficulties and debt to Mr. Hawk, and Brainard's attempts to interest the government and military in uses for Flubber. Shelby Ashton (Elliott Reid), who was interested in Betsy, is given his revenge by the Professor, who keeps on jumping on the top of Shelby's car, until it crashes into a police car, where he is given a field sobriety test.
Looking for backers, he bounces his Flubber ball for an audience, but his investment pitch proves so long-winded that most of the crowd has left before they notice that the ball bounced higher on its second bounce than on its first. For a more successful demonstration, he makes his Model T fly by bombarding Flubber with radioactive particles. Other adventures and misadventures result as Flubber is used on the bottoms of basketball players' shoes (in a crucial game) giving them tremendous jumping ability; Brainard (at a school dance) making him an accomplished dancer, and the scheming businessman Alonzo Hawk, who switches cars on the professor, with a car containing a squirrel and pigeons. Hawk then must be tackled by a full football team to bring him down after Brainard tricks him into testing Flubber on the bottom of his shoes. The Professor retrieves the old Model T from the warehouse, and Hawk is arrested for having a gun in his possession, when the car crashes into a police car. Eventually, Brainard shows his discovery to the government, after being scared by a missile in flight, and also wins back Miss Carlisle, culminating in a wedding at last.

Tags: romantic, fantasy

Review:
The Absentminded Professor was the second film that Fred MacMurray in his second career rebirth with Walt Disney as the midwife.
He scored an enormous success in The Shaggy Dog and Disney films together with his My Three Sons TV series established MacMurray as the quintessential family father figure which would endure for the rest of his life.I do remember seeing this in the theater back as a youngster and back then the younger ones in the crowd were looking at Tommy Kirk who was at the height of his Disney popularity.
Nevertheless MacMurray gives a delightful performance as science professor Ned Brainerd who's accidentally invented a variation on rubber which has a great deal more bounce to it.He's so wrapped up in his experiment that he's even forgetting his wedding day to Nancy Olson, AGAIN.
Other than helping his college win a basketball game with a team that they are way overmatched against, he's not quite decided what use this stuff he calls flubber is good for.
But wealthy Keenan Wynn sure wants to get his hands on it.Funniest sequence in the film is Keenan Wynn after MacMurray and Olson trick him into wearing flubberized shoes is seeing bounce slowly into the stratosphere before a quick thinking Tommy Kirk devises a way to counteract his flubberized dad.The AbsentMinded Professor was so popular with audiences that Disney did another version with almost the entire same cast in Son of Flubber.That one was almost as funny, but this still has a lot of laughs even after almost fifty years..
Small coincidence, because the movie was also directed by Robert Stevenson.So, if you are looking for a film that will not offend, and offer a few chuckles and will captivate your child's attention, check out The Absent Minded Professor.Also, IMHO, do not wast time with the Flubber remake.CheersC.
The Absent Minded ProfessorClassic family from from Walt Disney that stars Fred MacMurray in the title role as a rather forgetful and absent minded professor who invents a strange putty substance that drives him and his close contacts bonkers.
The movie is much more inspired, likable and family-friendly (not to mention funnier and more charming) than the remake starring Robin Williams, which was written by John Hughes long after his career had fallen downwards.
This is probably one of the best live action films Disney has ever released.
Fred MacMurray once again proved how great a comedic actor he was and this film is just a confirmation of it.
However, the real scene stealer in this film is Keenan Wynne as old man Hawk.
That scene alone is what makes this film a classic comedy..
The Absent-Minded Professor was a typical Disney classic that I watched when I was younger.
In short, this film is about a professor who creates an anti-gravity substance known as 'flubber'.
Of course, someone is trying to kidnap this idea, and it's up to some children to save the day.I am not sure what children today would think of this film, but I did find it enjoyable, and I would have seen it in the mid-1980s.
Watch This Fun, Screwball Romp - but ONLY If You Are Not Jaded and Have Lost Sight of What Simple Fun Is. I think it is time this movie is reviewed by its positive qualities and not just centered on how utterly sophisticated the reviewer would like to be remembered by the readers of IMDB.com.First of all, let me say there is nothing wrong with "hokum" or old American values or screwball comedies or old Disney movies.
This movie was fun to watch and funny in enough places to warrant a watch by any self-respecting human being with a warm sense of humor.Second of all, The Absent-Minded Professor elicited a wonderful collection of chuckles from me.
But, the record stands that I did laugh, and with some old-fashioned "glee", I might add.Third of all, I believe comedies are sometimes taken too seriously:  As if we were supposed to come away with some vastly profound elucidation from the experience.
Unlike some critics, I thought Fred MacMurray was perfect in the title role, and the supporting cast was great.
And though the Robin Williams remake gave it the new age CGI, the black and white gives the movie such a good feel.
The re-make was done in 1997 with the movie, "Flubber."Fred MacMurray, Nancy Olson, Keenan Wynn, Tommy Kirk.....wow, there are some familiar names from the '50s and '60s Olson had lost her youthful looks from "Sunset Boulevard," but that had been a decade earlier.
MacMurray didn't look a whole lot different from his 1944 film noir classic of "Double Indemnity," proving once again how much better men age than women.Kids of today would still laugh at this film, although they have dead spots in here which are not prevalent in modern-day films..
...and one of the best by Disney.You can't see this film and not enjoy the time of you life.It's clever, funny, and inventive.Please forget Robin Williams' version.That was a waste of celluloid.I'm a professor and was just thinking about the "absent-minded " effect yesterday.Or was I??
Fred MacMurray had a wonderful career with leading roles in all types of films.
Toward the end of his career, he made some family films for Walt Disney and starred in TV series.
And, he still did an occasional other film - drama, Western, comedy or other."The Absent-Minded Professor" is his second Disney family movie, after the successful 1959 "The Shaggy Dog."This film was an even bigger box office success.
It's a fun family film for kids of all ages.
A basketball game with the Medfield College team bouncing to the rafters and leaping onto backboards will leave one wondering how Disney filmed those scenes.
Besides MacMurray, Keenan Wynn, Nancy Olson, Leon Ames and Elliott Reid add some comedy.The movie received three Academy Award nominations, for camera work, art and set work and special effects.
Yet he was a consummate actor in any genre, and one of the best entertainers for several hit comedy films during Hollywood's golden age.All of MacMurray's films continue to please audiences well into the 21st century.
This film is a good one for family time to laugh and smile together.
i won't say this a great movie,but i will say it sure beats the dreadful 1997 remake called Flubber starring Robin Williams.that movie was tedious,to say the least.this movie,at least,was somewhat entertaining,if not all that funny.there are a couple of mildly amusing moments.there is a lot of overacting,which i have found quite typical of Disney movies of that era(1950's through 70's)but that was probably funny back then.Fred MacMurray plays the main character,professor Brainard,a chemistry professor who discovers a new compound that should revolutionize the world.of course,he's so busy working on his experiments,he neglects everything else in his life.MacMurray is very appealing and likable,as he is in any of his movies.my vote for The Absent Minded Professor is a 5/10.
I think a film that can be shared from generation to generation like that qualifies it as a classic.I never saw the original release but saw it as a kid on its re-release to theaters around 1975.
AMP did this 7 years before "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" came out in 1968.Fred McMurray is extremely adept as his portrayal of the clichéd absent-minded professor.
I'm impressed at his range of acting talent - as in his classic film noir "Double Indemnity" to this lighthearted comedy.
I also think Keenan Wynn is very good as loan shark Alonzo Hawk.While my kids enjoyed this when they were small, they would probably consider it "lame" now as teenagers.
Could Oscar Werner or Marcello Mastroianni possibly compare with Fred MacMurray, with his toupee, pancaked face, wacky gleam in his eye as the, uh, nutty professor of Medfield College who discovers Flubber??
Could the flying Jesus in "Vita" measure up to Nancy Olson and Fred spooning amid the clouds in the Flubberized Model T?
I prefer the sexual tension between Fred, Nancy, and Elliot Reid.And Flubber will finally be put to good use for the benefit of all the civilized nations of the worlds.I love this movie.
In general, the film does look very nice indeed and the special effects are fun and interesting especially with Flubber and the car.
The soundtrack is infectious too, while not consistently hilarious The Absent Minded Professor is always very amusing, with some funny scripting and especially the classic scene at the basketball game.
MacMurray plays Ned Brainerd, a collegiate professor who devises an invention, "Flubber" (flying rubber) which is super-bouncy and allows his car to defy gravity.
A rich alumni, Alonzo Hawk (Keenan Wynn) wishes to get his hands on the invention and the millions of dollars it is guaranteed to garner, so he uses under-handed methods to try to wrest control of Ned's spectacular discovery.
Their is good humor throughout this movie, particularly when Hawk's desires become known to Ned and Ned uses "Flubber" to make Hawk bounce out-of-control.
This film is one of the Disney Company's first comedies and one can only wish that their later one's are half-as-funny as this early venture.
Small town chemistry professor, known for his forgetful, befuddled nature yet something of a closet science-genius as well, accidentally creates a rubbery substance in his garage laboratory which generates its own energy (flying rubber--or, as Fred MacMurray keeps reminding us, Flubber).
Box-office hit most likely squeaked by on its special effects; those not in the mood for leaping, bouncing slapstick can amuse themselves by counting the number of times the editor cuts to MacMurray's dog for quizzical reactions.
I was worried that The Absent-Minded Professor wouldn't hold up after all these years, but it's still fun to watch and it kept my kids entertained, as well.
Just Silly Disney Fun. Fred MacMurray plays the vacuous title character who ignores everything in life when it comes to a new discovery.
Cheerful, brainless nonsense is the order of the day, with generous helpings of good old American domestic values.Medfield College is a pleasant small-town campus peopled with pleasant clean-cut students and staff, and conspicuous among the latter is Ned Brainard, the Absent-Minded Professor.
Just as nutty scientists are supposed to do, he builds a labyrinth of bubbling tubes and flasks in his own garage - and this, too, blows up.The eccentric professor (played solidly and reliably by Fred MacMurray) discovers a marvellous anti-gravity gunge which he christens flying rubber, or 'flubber'.
His son Biff has been excluded from the College basketball team because of bad grades (having been flunked in chemistry class by Prof Brainard), and without this star player, the Medfield team is being trounced by Rutland College at half-time.
The eccentric professor saves the day by ironing flubber onto the soles of the Medfield players' gym shoes, and the home team bounces to victory.The scheming Alonzo Hawk steals the professor's flying car and replaces it with an ordinary Model T.
Shot in monochrome using simple sets, the film relies throughout on 'bouncing' jokes, as various characters discover the properties of gravity-defying flubber.
Brainard gets his car, Hawk is rescued from an uncontrollable flubber-bounce when he is tackled by the college football team, and the absent-minded professor flies his car to Washington to place his invention at Uncle Sam's disposal.Mildly enjoyable tosh as it is, the film somehow lacks gusto.
Robert Stevenson directed this Disney comedy that stars Fred MacMurray as Medfield College professor Brainard, an absent-minded man who can't even remember his own wedding, who invents a new substance that is a kind of flying rubber he names Flubber, which he uses on his Model T car or on the shoes of the basketball team to make them jump higher.
Only crooked businessman Alonzo Hawk(played by Keenan Wynn) has faith in the discovery, but of course he wants to steal it for himself, and tries to enlist his son Biff(played by Tommy Kirk) to help him.
Silly film has some funny scenes but is just too lightweight and the comedy too broad to succeed.
I saw "Flubber", starring Robin Williams, more than once in the late 90's, I guess when it was new to the video format, but never knew it was a remake until I saw it again last year, probably for the first time since late last decade, and wasn't all that impressed (not sure exactly what I thought of it before).
Over a year later, I've finally seen the original, "The AbsentMinded Professor", a live action Disney flick released in 1961, starring Fred MacMurray.
I wasn't absolutely blown away by it, nor was I expecting to be, but I was expecting it to be better than its 1997 remake, with more laughs, and I think my moderate expectations were basically met.Ned Brainard is an absent-minded physical chemistry professor at Medfield College.
A couple explosions early in the film, plus the main character playing tricks with his flying Model-T, getting his foe in trouble with the police one night, and some of the other things done with the Flubber, to be good comical moments, some more than others.
I guess it hasn't aged as well as many other movies from around the same time or before, and probably can't please as many people today as it could upon its original release in the early 60's, during its box office success.
"Flubber" obviously has more modern aspects than "The AbsentMinded Professor", but had potential to be so much better than it turned out to be, especially with Robin Williams in the lead role, and its predecessor remains superior.
A professor Brainard (Fred MacMurray) discovers a substance he calls flubber.
The flubber was the only halfway interesting about the movie (I mean the actual substance).
Ned Brainard (Fred MacMurray) is an accident-prone professor in Medfield College of Technology.
Alonzo Hawk figures out Brainard's secret and looking to make a bundle off of Flubber.
However, Brainard wants to give his discovery over to the government.This black and white Disney film is fun magic for the first hour.
It doesn't feel like the right fit for a fun family movie.
The Absent-Minded Professor was the 1961 Disney classic about a nerdy college professor, delightfully played by Fred MacMurray, who invents an anti-gravity substance that comes to be known as "flubber", which he uses to make his automobile airborne and help his college's basketball team finally w in a few games, while keeping a corrupt local businessman (Keenan Wynn) from stealing the substance for itself.After playing an adulterous slimeball the previous year in The Apartment, MacMurray proved that he could play a nice guy too and pretty much carved out an entire new career for himself, which included the TV series MY THREE SONS and a few more Disney comedies.
A stupid but enjoyable comedy from Disney, with MacMurray well cast in the title role.
Good old movie; now we know what Flubber actually is!!!!!.
"The Absent Minded Professor" is about, well, see the title!!!!!
He makes this flying rubber stuff known as "Flubber," and it can do many things from bounce off walls to making automobiles fly in the sky!!!!!This was seen in two versions: the colorized version, which I recall played on the Old Disney Channel so many times, and the B&W version, the version that I had seen first.
The villainous character of Alonzo Hawk got his first screen appearance in this breezy Disney comedy that had audiences howling over the fictitious invention of "flubber", a rubbery substance that can make basketball players jump to heights unimaginable, cars fly over the Capitol building and bring villainous bankers to new heights of comeuppance.
Keenan Wynn appeared as Hawk in three Disney movies (and various variations of his character with different names), and here, he's doing the bouncy-bouncy on his front lawn in a way that attracts an entire neighborhood, even hot dog vendors.
It's all because of the research of the wacky professor played by Fred MacMurray, finishing up his latest invention (flubber) and forgetting all about his marriage to college secretary Nancy Olsen.
MacMurray wants to make sure that flubber remains under the protection of the United States, so this keeps Hawk determined to remain one step ahead of him, first by stealing MacMurray's flying model T, then by using nefarious methods and paid bullies to try and get it back before MacMurray gets to Washington D.C.A cast of familiar character actors as well as young Tommy Kirk (as Wynn's bumbling son) fill out the ensemble here which includes a cameo by Ed Wynn (Keenan's father) as the fire chief trying vainly to get his (off-screen) son to stop bouncing.
MacMurray, then a popular TV dad on "My Three Sons", found himself a new career with this and probably saved himself from becoming a has-been, but unfortunately, outside of film fanatics, isn't as well remembered today...that is, until people realize the variety of his work.
I saw this on AMC and the guy presenting it said The Absent Minded Professor is Disney's second live action film.
Anyway, the special effects are dated (if you can actually call them special effects) but the scenes with the Professor's car lifting into the air and flying off are somewhat magically; especially in black and white.
He ends up inventing a substance with exponential potential energy and uses it to make a flying car, help basketball players win a game and help him win back the heart of his soon to be bride.
Fred MacMurray and Flubber.
I remember seeing this movie all the time when I was a little kid.
Professor Ned Brainerd (Fred MacMurray) is a professor at Medfield College, who is known for (among other things) constantly missing his wedding to the school president's secretary Betsy Carlisle (Nancy Olson).
It's a very entertaining film, and the Hawk character would go on to appear in 2 other Disney films, Herbie Rides Again and Son of Flubber.
The acting for the most part is good and MacMurray is really fun to watch here.