I saw this together with another Perry Mason film from the very same year. They could not be more different.The other film leveraged the detective genre and the Gardner formula. It used the twists, the detective and the trial as intended.This one is more of a Thin Man clone: banter, silliness. It has Perry as simply a detective. There is a twist, and it could have been very effective. (The person accused and protected by Mason believes she is the killer and tries to frame Mason.) But it gets lost in the attempt at entertainment of a different kind. I think what happened is that Warner decided to change their approach after this and get back to what makes Perry work.On the relationship with the audience, there is an implied link when Perry addresses a jury; that link has him directly speaking to us. In this one, that is gone and the relationship with the viewer is established in a more theatrical way: they act silly and we are supposed to giggle.Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

"The Case of the Velvet Claws," made in 1936, is a Perry Mason mystery that has Della and Perry as newlyweds starting off on their honeymoon. In the TV series, and even more in the TV movies later on, there was always that unspoken love between Della and Perry - and no one knew what went on after office hours. In real life, Erle Stanley Gardner married his secretary Jeanne right before he died, I suppose so she could inherit. So in some sense, the Perry-Della thing was modeled on his real life.The two don't get to start their honeymoon because a woman (Wini Shaw) kidnaps Perry at gunpoint. She pays him $5000 to make sure a story about to be published in a tabloid about a politician doesn't come out - because it's about him and a woman, and she's the woman. Perry later finds out she's the wife of the owner of the paper! When the owner is found dead, Perry's own client blames him for the murder.Warren William gives his usual lighthearted, devil my care performance. Even though his portrayal has nothing to do with Perry Mason, he's a riot. Instead of Paul Drake, he has some sort of an assistant named Spudsy Drake. The exotic-looking Winifred Shaw brings class and spark to her character. Who can forget her "Lullaby of Broadway" opening in "The Gold Diggers of 1935?" She had a very special quality. For some reason, her career died. Probably Warners failed to pick up her option in 1939. A shame.I enjoy these films, but don't confuse them with Erle Stanley Gardner's Perry Mason. He hated these movies.

After the disgraceful silliness of THE CASE OF THE LUCKY LEGS, Warren William's Perry Mason seems back on firm ground in a film that takes itself much more serious without forgetting to include healthy doses of character humor. What sets this one apart from the others is Perry & Della getting MARRIED (a development completely forgotten in the follow-up that starred Ricardo Cortez) and Perry being the #1 murder suspect, having been to see the victim moments before he was bumped-- a situation he has all too often had to get his clients out of-- including the woman's husband in this case. She had threatened both Perry and her husband with a gun, and would only NOT be a suspect to anyone watching this because it would just be "too obvious"!! Of WW's 3 Dellas, my favorite, Claire Dodd returns after having been absent from the previous installment. All 3 Dellas in the first 4 pictures have something to recommend them, I just happen to think Dodd is the most attractive (though Genevieve Tobin's was without a doubt the FUNNIEST). Sadly, Allan Jenkins, who played in cop in ...THE HOWLING DOG and "Spudsy" Drake in eps. 2 & 3, is replaced here by Eddie Acuff, who just doesn't seem to "work". Very oddly, Olin Howard returns as Coroner Wilber Strong from ...THE CURIOUS BRIDE, after having played a different doctor in the previous film! (Did anyone at Warner Brothers care about "continuity" in this series??) The standard routine of set-up, murder, investigation and courtroom expose so far is limited to ...THE HOWLING DOG. In WW's other 3 films, he solves the murders at a dinner party, in his office during a medical check-up, and at the hang-out of the killer before moving on to the street in front of a hotel. The only time we see the inside of a courtroom in this film is when Perry & Della get hitched-- and when she tries to have it annulled. CRAZY!! The other point of interest for me was actress Carol Hughes (my favorite "Dale Arden" from 1940's FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE) who is almost completely unrecognizable in here due to bright blonde hair and a southern accent.I love Warren William's Perry Mason-- I DO! And I wish he'd done a lot more of these. But I also wish he'd done more like the 1st one, where at least, despite the huge differences, I could actually recognize the format and the character of the "real" Perry Mason, instead of this rambling comedic chaos WB kept foisting on audiences!

(Some Spoilers) More like a 1930's screwball comedy then the serious and overly complicated courtroom drama that your used to seeing "The Case of the Velvet Claws" has Perry Mason, Warren William, acting like a chicken without a head not knowing what crimes are exactly going on in the movie much less knowing how to solve them.Perry himself is implicated in the murder of business tycoon George Belter, Joe King, by his estranged wife Eva, Wini Shaw. The funny, if you can call it that, thing about all this is that Perry was in fact hired by Eva, using a phony name, to get George's sleazy exploitive rag "Spicy Bit's" to kill a story that it's about to publish. The story has her, or the other woman, having an illicit affair with happily married and straight as an arrow State Senator Peter Milnor, Kenneth Harlan.Perry who at the beginning of the movie tied the knot with his long suffering, in putting up with him, and faithful private secretary Della Street, Claire Dodd, never got a chance to spend his wedding night together, in blissful harmony, when he was kidnapped by Eva Stuart, really Eva Belter. Eva afraid of her lover, Peter Milnor, being exposed by her husbands, who runs the paper from behind the scenes, tabloid tries to get Perry to go see Spicy Bit's editor Frank Locke, Madison Richards, and talk him out of publishing the story. Perry finds out second-hand from Locke that Mr. Belter is the one bankrolling the paper and goes to see him at his mansion only to get himself kicked out by Digley, Stuart Holmes, the butler.It's a few minutes later after Perry was given the heave ho Eve shows up and after trying to get Belter to kill the story about her and Mr.Milnor ends up, we don't really know for sure since it all happens off camera, killing him with a single gunshot from her .32 pistol. Perry caught completely by surprise in Belter's murder and being the last person seen leaving his mansion, before he was murdered, is now the #1 suspect in his death! What makes things even worse for Perry is that he's been fingered by the person who not only was at the scene of Belter's murder but is his client as well Mrs. Eve Belter!Even though Perry looks and acts totally confused, as well as having walking pneumonia, he's given a break by the very favorable script at the end of the movie by solving Betler's murder by having it pinned on someone who had absolutely no reason for murdering him. ****SPOILER ALERT****With him, Belter's killer, knowing that he's, instead of his cheating wife Eva, to inherit all of his millions he suddenly pulls out a gun and plugs a shocked and surprised Betler not wanting to wait for the old man to die of natural causes! He just couldn't help himself!This brainless action on Belter's killers part opened him up to being blackmailed almost as soon as the gun-smoke even cleared by being spotted by Betler's maid Mrs. Veite, Ruth Robinson. Here the killer murdered someone, Geoge Betler, who was only going to help him by leaving his estate over to him and on the other hand doesn't murder the one person, Mrs. Veite, who can implicate him in Betler's murder!With the guilty party taken away by the police Perry can now carry on with Della as man and wife but not after he gave everyone in the cast, including Della, a serious case influenza by sneezing his head off, and in their faces, all throughout the movie and not at all bothering to see a doctor to treat him!