Flubber is a 1997 film produced by Disney starring Robin Williams and Marcia Gay Harden. It is a remake of the 1961 Disney film, The Absent-Minded Professor.
Synopsis
(From Allmovie):
Although flub is defined as to make a mess of, the word flubber is a contraction from flying rubber. In this remake of the 1961 comedy-fantasy The Absent Minded Professor, Robin Williams takes on the role created by Fred MacMurray and later executed by Harry Anderson on television, while the 1961 film's Flubber with anti-gravity properties has now been digitally reincarnated as a translucent green, pulsating, bouncing blob that loves to dance the mambo. Absent-minded college professor Philip Brainard (Robin Williams), employed at a near-bankrupt university, creates the formula for Flubber, yet he can't remember to show up for his own wedding to university President Sara Jean Reynolds (Marcia Gay Harden).
His rival, Wilson Croft (Christopher McDonald), plots to steal Sara and the Flubber from Brainard. Rich, powerful and corrupt businessman Chester Hoenicker (Raymond J. Barry), who has almost the entire college staff on his payroll, tries to force Brainard to pass his failing son Bennett (Wil Wheaton), but he soon takes an interest in Flubber after hearing about it from his flunkies (Clancy Brown, Ted Levine). After using Flubber to fly over clouds in his 1963 T-Bird, Brainard realizes Flubber can also improve the performance of the school's pathetic basketball team. Jodi Benson is the voice of Weebo, Brainard's talking, flying household robot, with a video display of Disney clips at odd moments.
Many gags are embellishments from the 1961 film, with John Hughes (Home Alone) rewriting the original Bill Walsh screenplay (based on Samuel W. Taylor's short story, A Situation of Gravity). Though Walsh died in 1975, he received posthumous credit for this script. Filming began October 8, 1996 in San Francisco.
Box office
Flubber performed well at the box office. It made $92,977,226 in the United States and a total of $85 million in other countries for a grand total of $177,977,226 internationally.
Trivia
- Robin Williams showed up on the set with matching shaved eyebrows.
- In the video, the building that was shot as Ford's headquarters is actually Adobe Systems' headquarters in San Jose, California.
- Special effects were done mainly by two studios: Industrial Light and Magic and Hammerhead Studios.
- In The Simpsons episode Children of a Lesser Clod, Flubber is directly referenced by Professor Frink. Also in the episode Please Homer, Don't Hammer 'Em..., Homer Simpson says to Professor Frink "No problem, but why don't you go inside and stir your Flubber while I get to work!!!"
- Several scenes in the movie were shot at Mercy High School in Burlingame, CA.
- The two thugs that work for the villain Hoenicker are Smith and Wesson, a nod to the Massachusetts-based handgun manufacturer of the same name.
- In the movie Superstar, Flubber is referenced in the video rental store scene when the cheerleader informs her boyfriend that she's "renting Flubber again."
- Nancy Olson, who played the part of Professor Brainard's love interest Betsy in The Absent Minded Professor, makes a brief, uncredited cameo in this film.
- Chicago Cubs radio broadcaster Pat Hughes is featured as the announcer at the basketball game.
External links
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