The Absent-Minded Professor

Ned Brainard is a professor of chemistry. He has forgotten his own wedding three times; working in the lab he loses track of time entirely. During one experiment he produces an unexpected substance: a rubber that gains energy as it bounces rather than losing it. He applies it to shoes, to his car and to the school basketball team. The subject is not the invention but the inventor being unable to tell anyone. It is not that Brainard fails to understand what he has; the problem is that he cannot find anyone to take him seriously, and loses his marriage in the meantime. The form is the sixties Disney comedy template and its tricks still work. The flying car and the basketball sequence were made with wires, reversed footage and concealed platforms; the film was nominated for an Oscar for visual effects and also in black and white cinematography and art direction. It was one of Disney's biggest earners of the period and a sequel followed two years later. The name invented for the substance became a permanent English word. Fred MacMurray plays the professor, Nancy Olson his fiancée and Keenan Wynn the businessman who wants to steal the discovery. Robert Stevenson directs. Who it is for: viewers who like classical Disney live-action comedy and anyone watching with a child. Who it is not for: anyone after narrative complexity; the film uses a single joke all the way through.