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Produced and directed by German veteran Joe May and starring his wife, Mia May, this allegorical drama was based on a screenplay by Fritz Lang, the future director's first entry into the burgeoning film industry. May played the title role, an actress who makes the mistake of marrying a murderer (Ernst Matray). The husband is subsequently slain by the police, but their offspring may have inherited his father's mental defect. In due time, Hilde is forced to prevent her son from committing further crimes against humanity. Typical of Lang's later oeuvre, a figure of Death was superimposed onto the film's early scenes, foreshadowing Hilda's ultimate fate. Contrary to published reports, Lang did not play Death himself: Hilde Warren under der Tod was produced in Berlin, at a time when the screenwriter was recuperating in Vienna from wounds suffered during the Austrian campaign in Poland.