Compound Cinematics: Akira Kurosawa and I

Any list of Japan’s greatest screenplay writers would feature Shinobu Hashimoto near or at the top. This memoir, focusing on his collaborations with Akira Kurosawa, a gifted scenarist in his own right, offers an indispensable insider account and invaluable insights into the unique process that is writing for the screen. Now in paperback, Compound Cinematics also stands as a moving reckoning of sorts.

The vast majority of Kurosawa’s oeuvre was filmed from screenplays that the director co-wrote with a stable of stellar scenarists. Among these was the author, who caught the filmmaker’s attention with a script that eventually turned into Rashomon, and who went on to play an integral part in developing and writing two of the grandmaster’s crowning jewels—Ikiru and Seven Samurai—and other cineaste favorites.

The late Shinobu Hashimoto (1918-2018) penned numerous films of note for other directors as well, including Harakiri for Masaki Kobayashi, Mount Hakkoda for Shiro Moritani, and Village of the Eight Tombs for Yoshitaro Nomura.