A mysterious stranger presents a boy with a VCR that can "play" the past...and the future. How it affects the boy and his struggling middle-class family is the central story.
Jimmy Harper (Gary Webster) loves to gamble and enjoys enough success to bring him to the attention of a group of men who play for big money. Soon Jimmy decides to change his name to James Harper, to reflect his increased importance, and seeks a way out of his job in a factory. However, as the stakes in the games increase, Jimmy/James may begin to wonder whether he is in over his head and has risked too much...
Historian Diarmaid MacCulloch explores both what it means to be English and what has shaped English identity, from the Dark Ages, through the Reformation to modern times.
