Charming introduction to one of Edinburgh’s living legends

Sean Hignett, one of scores of interviewees in Ece Ger’s feature-length documentary Meeting Jim, says of Jim Haynes’s Paperback Bookshop in Edinburgh: “It was a place you came for a free coffee and to steal the books. Jim was so idealistic he didn’t mind that his books were occasionally taken.” It’s one of the opening shots in a profile that tells of an extraordinary, humble, generous man whose slow Louisiana drawl and laid-back style belie his energy and vision.

Haynes — cultural entrepreneur, bon viveur, friend, lover, living legend — founded the UK’s first paperback bookshop in 1959 and, a few years later, the Traverse Theatre. Later, in London, he set up the Arts Lab, in Drury Lane, and the underground magazines International Times and Suck. For the past 40 years he has hosted a Sunday dinner in his atelier in Rue de la Tombe-Issoire, in Paris’s 14th arrondissement. Each week, upwards of a hundred guests, mostly strangers, descend on the small apartment to meet and converse over homemade food. Many leave as future lovers, spouses or colleagues. “I have a duty, which I elected to perform, and that is to introduce everyone around me to each other,” he says. Ger’s producer, Marta Benavides Hidalgo, cinematographer Gilliam de la Torre and sound recordist Oguzhan Akalin met for the first time on 21 June, 2015, at a Haynes Sunday dinner. Three years later, Meeting Jim has had its world premiere in Edinburgh. Filmed over 45 days, hundreds of hours of footage, dozens of interviews and a pile of archival material have been reduced to 75 minutes of “essential Haynes”.

De La Torre’s exquisite imagery and an almost perfect soundscape combine with deft editing and a simple structure to create a layered portrait. The cast of characters is as long as your arm. There are interviews with Angela Bartie, the historian, Steven Berkoff, the actor, and the late Stephanie Wolff Murray, publisher extraordinaire. Although short and anecdotal, the interviews build a picture of Haynes, who says: “Happiness is an intellectual decision . . . Life is short and we have an obligation to enjoy ourselves.”

What the film lacks in deeper analysis of his motivations and the conditions that created them, it makes up for in sheer enthusiasm, warmth and commitment. Haynes is a survivor of the Sixties and that idealistic spirit shines through, filling the audience with a sense that everyone is worth meeting, with a story to tell. And a dream: if there were more Sunday dinners, the world would be a better place.