Four episodes into TABOO so far and loving it. TABOO is an eight-part British TV series created by Steven Knight, Tom Hardy and his father, and is based on a story written by Tom Hardy. Hardy is fantastic in the lead role as James Delaney.

The year is 1814, and the war between Britain and America is drawing to a close. James Delaney returns to Britain after 12 years in Africa to attend his father’s funeral and claim his inheritance, which includes a piece of land on the western coast of Canada. Control of this land will affect the Canadian-American border being drawn up between the UK and USA, while also providing a trade route to China. This draws the interest and animosity of America, the British crown and the East India Trading Company. The result is a highly intriguing cat and mouse game between these players with Delaney pulling the strings (sorry for mixed metaphor). The story works as part Dickens, part Western, part fantasy.

Delaney exudes menace as an anti-hero, collecting a cast of villains to help him carry out his plans for his father’s property and regain the love of his half-sister, with whom he’d had an incestuous relationship before leaving England. He transcends the rigid moral and social conventions of the day by simply refusing to recognize their importance, freeing him to do what needs doing. It makes a great contrast with the British aristocracy with whom he sometimes mingles, as they observe the conventions outwardly while breaking them whenever it’s expedient, making them hypocrites. Delaney is a bad man, but at least he’s honest, and those fighting him are far worse.

The show is incredibly dark and gritty, providing a richly rendered London of 1814. Kind of Tim Burtonish, if Burton were pissed off and a punk rocker. The time and place make Delaney’s character larger than life, and the more incredible things he does are much more fun and credible than if the story were set in the modern day.

I hope the rest of the series plays out as well as the first. I’m anxious for more!

THE MAN FROM EARTH (2007) offers a mind-bending premise. What if somebody you knew told you he’d lived for more than 14,000 years?

John Oldman, a university professor, is packing up his belongings as he’s decided to leave town, something he does every 10 years or so. His colleagues surprise him at his house with a farewell party. Pressed to reveal why he’s leaving, Oldman reluctantly tells them that he’s a Cro-Magnon man who’s been alive for 14,000 years.

His colleagues play along until they see he’s serious, at which they have a variety of reactions, particularly as he becomes more and more convincing. Some enjoy the argument for what they think it is, an intellectual exercise. Some are outright hostile and think he’s either overplaying a joke or is having some sort of mental breakdown. And at least one becomes convinced. As there is really no way to determine if he’s telling the truth, it all becomes a matter of faith.

Then Oldman offers a terrifying revelation, pushing some of them to the edge of reason.

It’s an interesting movie with a great premise. Though all set in a single location and comprised almost entirely of dialogue, the film captures you. That being said, I found some of it weak. The big revelation is provocative but not that much so, and is in fact based on a historical theory that doesn’t hold up. The colleagues often overreact, which I suppose keeps a dialogue-intensive movie going, though it reminded me I was watching a movie. The second big revelation is a great a-ha moment but also so coincidental as to be contrived, particularly after the first revelation.

Overall, it’s an interesting film, an intriguing thought piece, but not particularly mind-blowing. I liked it and appreciated it for what it was–a movie about an idea, something rare these days.