Harry Potter’s many young fans could find the sight of Daniel Radcliffe being shot to pieces disturbing. But according to the teenage actor, his new role as Rudyard Kipling’s ill-fated son offers an important Remembrance message.

ITV is prepared for complaints over My Boy Jack, the story of the author’s son, who went missing in action on a First World War battlefield after his father pulled strings to get him a commission. Kim Cattrall plays Kipling’s American wife, Carrie, in the £10 million film, to be screened on Sunday as part of the channel’s Armistice Day commemorations. The film shows the fate of Lieutenant John “Jack” Kipling at the Battle of Loos in France with brutally violent clarity.

Radcliffe, 18, whose first television role this is, said that he wanted young Potter fans to watch the two-hour film. “I hope people are moved,” he said. “The thought of forgetting all those people who fought is terrible. We are lucky not to have to endure those conditions now.”

Radcliffe, who said that a great-uncle of his had been sent to the Great War, added: “It is hard not to feel the parallels with what is happening now in Iraq and Afghanistan. Parents outliving their children is the greatest tragedy imaginable.”

The Imperial War Museum in South London is holding an exhibition about Lieutenant John “Jack” Kipling, which opens today, to coincide with the film. Rudyard Kipling, the Jungle Bookauthor, was a powerful supporter of war with Germany.

When John failed the Forces medical on three occasions, because of severe shortsightedness, Kipling used his influence to get his son a commission with the Irish Guards.

John was posted to France on his 18th birthday. He was reported wounded and missing six weeks later in his first action at Loos, in September of 1915.

The anguished Kipling blamed himself for his role in the loss of his son, believed to have been killed in a mortar-shell attack.

My Boy Jack realises a 20-year dream for David Haig, who wrote the screenplay and plays the author. The Four Weddings and a Funeral actor began researching Kipling after discovering that they looked remarkably alike.

Haig said: “I looked at a photograph in 1985 and the resemblance is extraordinary, almost unnerving. I decided to start writing Rudyard’s story myself. It’s taken 22 years to realise this dream. Daniel Radcliffe was only 7 when I began writing the screenplay.”

Describing the attraction of Kipling, Haig said: “On the one hand you have the magical creator of the Jungle Book stories, a celebrity writer. And on the other you had the apologist for the British Empire who tyranically pursued his son’s joining of the Army.”

Cattrall, a star of Sex and the City, who is currently filming a feature film version of the TV series, spent months researching Carrie. She said: “I’m reminded of the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. Everyone was rallying for vengeance and retaliation. I can imagine a young man like John wanting to sign up and defend King and Country.”

She added: “Currently my own nephew wants to sign up and serve in Iraq. But I am powerless to stop him should his passion continue and he be accepted.”

Lost generation

–– John Kipling was accepted into the Irish Guards in August 1914. He died on only his second day on the front line, aged 18

–– More than 700,000 British men serving in the Army were killed in the Great War. More than half, including John, had no known grave

–– The Kiplings lost their six-year-old daughter to pneumonia in 1899. In 1919 they accepted that they had also lost their son

–– Kipling wrote a eulogy for his son: “Have you news of my boy Jack? Not this tide. When d’you think that he’ll come back? Not with this wind blowing, and this tide”

–– The Commonwealth War Graves Commission announced in 1992 that the grave of an “unknown Irish Guards Lieutenant” near Loos was that of John. New evidence strongly disputes this

–– The Imperial War Museum exhibition includes the last correspondence between Rudyard and John; Rudyard Kipling’s wartime passport and letters of condolence from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Theodore Roosevelt, both of whom lost sons

Source: Imperial War Museum

My Boy Jack will be screened on Sunday, November 11, at 9pm on ITV1

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