Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Professor Ned Brainard (Fred MacMurray) needs money for Medfield College. The Pentagon has made flubber top secret. He's running into red tape over the payment. The IRS is after him despite not receiving any actual money. Mr. Hawk is eager to see him fail. The college needs $350k by the first of the month to pay Hawk back. Ned's solution is to invent weather controlling flubbergas. Betsy's not impressed. Despite his objection, Betsy invites Shelby. To Betsy's horror, Shelby invites Ned's old flame Desiree de la Roche/Mary Lee Spooner.Hawk is a solid villain. The IRS guy is more annoying than funny. Then the money issue gets overused. I have a problem with Betsy. She's made out to be a flighty jealous money-grubber. The movie still has the wacky invention and the socially tone-deaf professor but his dismissal of her isn't that nice either. Their relationship is problematic and seems to be built on rickety scaffolding. It's meant to be funny like a sitcom. The movie really needs to start the couple with love before it injects all the obstacles. That really turns me off.

I first saw 1997's "Flubber", starring Robin Williams, not long after it was released on video, and never knew it was a remake at the time, but found that out around the time I watched the movie again many years later. That was how I later got around to watching the original 1961 film, "The AbsentMinded Professor", starring Fred MacMurray. It's been nearly a year and a half since I watched that film, but I still remember thinking it was better than the lacklustre remake. "Son of Flubber" is the 1963 sequel to the 1961 live action Disney movie, so I was bound to end up watching it eventually. As with most sequels, I was expecting this one to be downhill from the original, and I think it is (just slightly), but it's definitely still better than the 1997 movie.Professor Ned Brainard has introduced his invention of Flubber to the U.S. military, but when he goes to get paid for his amazing invention, he learns that the Pentagon has decided that the substance must be kept top secret, and they can't give the professor his payment for it yet. This doesn't help the fact that the future of Medfield College is once again in jeopardy due to financial problems, and that Ned and his wife, Betsy are broke and get a huge tax bill. However, the absent-minded physical chemistry professor has a new discovery which he hasn't unleashed upon the world yet. It's called Flubber gas, and it can change the weather! He believes this new gas can end his current troubles, and Biff Hawk plans to use it to help the college football team win a game. However, as Ned experiments with this Flubber gas, he ends up causing trouble which he is unaware of, and he also finds that his marriage is in trouble.This sequel didn't seem that interesting to me at first when I got around to watching it, but that soon changed. As a comedy, "Son of Flubber" certainly isn't hilarious, but the gags are often funny, even if there are no huge laughs. Memorable ones include the scenes with a certain Medfield College football player's uniform filled with Flubber gas, Ned making it rain inside with his new invisible substance and the way the dog reacts to it, and the professor not realizing that the Flubber gas is making glass shatter all over town, with people not knowing how it's happening! However, there also may be times when it gets a little too silly, and I wouldn't say most of the film is really that funny. Still, at least I can say I laughed at times, definitely more often than I did when I last watched "Flubber", the 1997 film. Aside from the humour, the story isn't exactly great, but it was enough to hold my interest, at least somewhat, though it did seem a tad overlong to me. I also think the cast is mostly good here, including Fred MacMurray.Since I waited quite a while to watch this sequel after watching "The AbsentMinded Professor" early last year, they're not as easy for me to compare as they would be if I had watched one just after the other. However, I clearly remember that I wasn't amazed by the 1961 Disney film, but still thought it was pretty good family fare, and unsurprisingly a case where the original is superior to the remake. This 1963 sequel isn't as popular as its predecessor, and even though I watched it a while after the original, I guess I can understand that, but it does come close in quality. Neither is an absolute classic (many animated Disney films that Walt Disney was around to produce are superior to these two live action ones made only several years before his death), but they still have their charm decades after they were originally released in the early 60's, even if this one was more of a cash-in and didn't have much new to offer after the original.

I love This Movie I don't take it too seriously. I just think it is great fun! I think it is just as good as absent minded professor in it's own way. .Flubber becomes a victim of "national security" and our hero Ned Brainerd (MacMurray) returns home empty handed from our nation's capital to find creditors threatening to cancel his newspaper subscription, predators threatening to bulldoze Medfield College, the IRS threatening to ruin his life, and his wife (Nancy Olsen) looking like a million bucks in her new mink coat while holding a check for same for something poor Ned doesn't own anymore and can't sell so that we can all enjoy the wonders of Flubberoleum and can safely drop our children on the floor without the fear of being locked up by Social Services. A very frustrating start to the terrific sequel to Absent Minded Professor, all adding to the friction of MacMurray, who must now invent something entirely new so that he can save Medfield, his home, and his marriage from the slimy advances of Prof. Shelby Ashton (Elliot Reid) and the return of luscious old flame Desiree DE la Roche (Joanna Moore).All the usual suspects are here from Disney's vast arsenal of character actors to keep us entertained while Ned goes about inventing a weather making glass breaking food growing machine. The Halloween chase scene with Prof. Brainerd terrorizing Shelby Ashton from above with his new rainmaking device is one of the funniest in Disney history. And of course we're treated to another Medfield sports showdown vs. national champs Rutland in a gridiron match up where Flubber becomes the great equalizer. Paul Lynde is absolutely hilarious as the football announcer

Proving that the Disney Studios didn't become cash-mongers simply in the Michael Eisner era, this sequel to the 1961 Disney hit "The Absent Minded Prodessor" is nothing more than repackaged goods. Lamebrained slapstick comedy has Fred MacMurray returning to role of small town inventor who attempts to save the local high school from ruin. There are a few funny digs at the advertising business but, as with the original, MacMurray's love life problems and his run-ins with the law are utterly dull. Colorful supporting cast (Jack Albertson, Joanna Moore, Paul Lynde, William Demarest) looks like a who's-who of suburban comedies, and the movie is fairly easy to sit through if you don't mind completely innocuous fare, but even the special effects are mechanical. ** from ****