NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

ADDITION: Undercrank Productions Blu-ray (July 2026): Undercrank Productions have transferred Robert Z. Leonard's The Cardboard Lover to Blu-ray and DVD. The 2026 Undercrank Productions restoration represents a major step forward for a film long hampered by the physical limitations of its surviving elements. The primary source is a 35mm nitrate print from the AFI/Marion Davies Collection, preserved by the Library of Congress in the early 1970s when it was already showing signs of decomposition. That inherent nitrate damage - visible as edge decay, soft areas, and density fluctuations - remains present to varying degrees, yet the digital work by Thad Komorowski and Samantha Davis of Cineaste Restoration, LLC has substantially minimized the worst affected zones. Additional 35mm fragments from the BFI National Archive and a French-language nitrate print of the final reel from the Blackhawk Films Collection fill gaps and strengthen continuity. Graded by Fabio Bedoya from 2K scans of these archival materials, the image retains a natural filmic texture rather than an overly scrubbed digital sheen. Contrast is stable, fine detail in faces and costumes is improved, and the Riviera sets and glossy MGM production design register with greater clarity than earlier circulating copies. While not a pristine showpiece free of all source flaws, the presentation is the most complete and watchable version of The Cardboard Lover yet available, and the included side-by-side comparison of Reel 5 makes the extent of the improvement transparent.

NOTE: We have added 74 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Undercrank Productions use a lossy Dolby track. As a silent film, the original 1928 presentation relied entirely on live accompaniment. Undercrank’s release supplies a newly composed and performed score by Ben Model, recorded on a custom Virtual Theatre Pipe Organ console using software from Paramount Organ Works and Hauptwerk Virtual Pipe Organ. Model’s work is light, rhythmic, and attuned to the film’s farce mechanics - supporting the physical comedy and romantic interludes without overwhelming Marion Davies’s pantomime. The recording is clean and well-balanced, with the organ’s characteristic color and presence intact. Copyrighted 2026 by Undercrank Productions LLC, the track is a dedicated new creation rather than a compiled library score, giving the Blu-ray a consistent and purposeful aural identity suited to home viewing. Undercrank Productions utilize original intertitles on their Region FREE Blu-ray.

The Undercrank Productions Blu-ray offers extras. Two substantial supplements accompany the feature. “Marion Davies: Steward of Her Legacy” (2026, 9:16 with optional English subtitles) by Marion Davies biographer Lara Gabrielle (Captain of Her Soul: The Life of Marion Davies.) It offers a concise, informative look at Davies’s role and the ongoing efforts to preserve and reappraise her comedy work. The second extra, a ten-minute side-by-side restoration comparison of Reel 5, is especially valuable: it places the original 35mm preservation material next to the newly restored version, allowing viewers to see the range of nitrate decomposition that existed at the time of preservation and the degree to which digital tools could remove, lessen, or repair those defects. Together the extras contextualize both the film’s history and the practical realities of restoring late-silent nitrate.

Robert Z. Leonard's The Cardboard Lover is a lively silent romantic farce that stands as one of Marion Davies’s strongest showcases of pure comic energy during her peak year of 1928. Produced amid the final flowering of silent cinema (between her King Vidor hits The Patsy and Show People,) it adapts Jacques Deval’s 1926 French play Dans sa candeur naïve and its 1927 Broadway version Her Cardboard Lover (co-adapted by P.G. Wodehouse), but inventively reverses the gender dynamics of the central triangle to center Davies as the active comic force. The plot unfolds on the French Riviera, primarily at a Monte Carlo hotel and casino. Sally Baxter (Davies), a spirited American flapper and compulsive autograph hunter touring Europe with schoolmates, becomes infatuated with André Briault (Nils Asther - By Candlelight, The Man in Half Moon, Bluebeard, The Hour Before the Dawn, The Bitter Tea of General Yen, Night Monster,) a handsome French tennis champion. She witnesses his volatile relationship with the exotic, two-timing Simone (Jetta Goudal - White Gold, The Coming Of Amos,) who is carrying on with a baritone (Andrés de Segurola - Go'in to Town.) After André breaks with Simone, Sally pursues him for an autograph, inadvertently loses a fortune playing baccarat against him at the casino, and proposes a solution: she will pose as his “cardboard lover” - a fake fiancée - to make Simone jealous and keep André from backsliding. Robert Z. Leonard’s (The Delicious Little Devil, Pride and Prejudice, Dancing Lady, When Ladies Meet, The Bribe,) direction and the screenplay (F. Hugh Herbert continuity, Carey Wilson adaptation, Lucille Newmark titles) emphasize tight farce mechanics - doors slamming, pursuits, and escalating persistence - while leveraging the Riviera setting for glossy production values typical of William Randolph Hearst’s Cosmopolitan unit (budget around $379,000). Cedric Gibbons’s (Gaslight, An American in Paris, The Wizard of Oz, The Bad and the Beautiful) sets and John Arnold’s (The Wind, Broadway Melody, The Big Parade, The Garden of Eden, Show People,) cinematography provide a polished backdrop of hotels, casinos, and villas that contrasts the American heroine’s breezy chaos with European sophistication. Marion Davies (It's a Wise Child, The Floradora Girl, Beauty's Worth, Lights of Old Broadway, The Red Mill, Five And Ten, From Headquarters, Operator 13, What Price Hollywood, Zander the Great, Beverly of Graustark) dominates as Sally: exuberant, physically fearless, and emotionally transparent. Thematically, the film plays with authenticity versus performance. Sally’s “cardboard” role becomes real through sheer persistence and emotional honesty, inverting the original play’s dynamics (in which a man is hired as a protective fake lover). In sum, The Cardboard Lover is a sparkling, star-driven farce that captures Marion Davies at her most vital: inventive, physical, and winningly sincere. It rewards both as pure entertainment and as a document of late-silent comedy craft, proving that the “cardboard” façade can conceal genuine depth when the right performer animates it. Undercrank Productions has delivered a carefully executed and historically responsible Blu-ray of The Cardboard Lover, a once-elusive Marion Davies comedy that now benefits from the best possible presentation of its surviving elements. The 2K restoration cannot erase every trace of nitrate decay, yet it meaningfully reduces the visual obstacles that previously limited enjoyment, while Ben Model’s organ score provides an appropriate and engaging modern accompaniment. The extras further enrich the package by documenting both the restoration process and Davies’s legacy. For silent-film enthusiasts and admirers of Davies’s comic peak year of 1928, this release is an essential addition - respectful of the source, transparent about its limitations, and successful in returning a lively, charming film to proper visibility. Silent Era fans should not miss out nabbing this one!

Gary Tooze