[Just Passin' By]

Shinobu Hashimoto, a screenwriter whose creative partnership with director Akira Kurosawa helped launch Japanese cinema to international prominence in the 1950s, died July 19 at his home in Tokyo. He was 100.

The cause was pneumonia, according to Japanese news media reports.

Working into his 90s, when a stroke effectively ended his career, Mr. Hashimoto wrote more than 70 screenplays for acclaimed directors including Tadashi Imai, Masaki Kobayashi and Mikio Naruse. But he was best known for his work with Kurosawa, in widely imitated films that ranged from the sword-fighting period piece “Seven Samurai” (1954) to lyrical explorations of justice and mortality in “Rashomon” (1950) and “Ikiru” (1952)...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local...=.8111143cce1a