And You146;ll Be a Man, My Son

A new film, My Boy Jack, describes how Rudyard Kipling sent his son to his death

A new film, My Boy Jack, describes how Rudyard Kipling sent his son to his death

IN discussions of Kipling, no word comes up more often than paradox: he was the prophet of both empire and its decline, a white supremacist and a connoisseur of exotic cultures, a friend of the common man and a foe of democracy. But never had his conflicted nature caused him so much grief as when he used personal influence to wheedle a commission in the Irish Guards for his severely myopic son John, known as Jack. With tragic inevitability, Jack, who was just 18, was killed in his first military engagement, the Battle of Loos, in September 1915.

The anguish that Kipling inflicted on himself and his family is the subject of My Boy Jack. Adapted by David Haig from his play of the same name, the film stars Daniel Radcliffe as Jack; Kim Cattrall as Carrie, Rudyard Kipling8217;s American wife; and Mr. Haig himself as Kipling.

The film was shot primarily in Ireland with an Irish crew. Though many of Kipling8217;s most popular early characters Private Mulvaney in Soldiers Three, Peachey Carnehan in The Man Who Would Be King and Kim in the novel of the same name are Irish or half-Irish, Kipling grew virulently anti-Irish in response to the rise of the Irish independence movement in the early 1900s. He called Dublin a city of 8220;dirt and slop,8221; and the Irish Home Rule Bill of 1912 an invitation to 8220;Rebellion, rapine, hate,/ Oppression, wrong and greed8221;. Under these circumstances Kipling must have found it mortifying to discover that Jack8217;s only military option was an Irish battalion.

The creators of My Boy Jack were aware of Kipling8217;s torturous relationship with the Irish but felt it had to be omitted from the story. For Haig, the family8217;s reaction to its loss was the strongest component of the drama. 8220;The Irish nationalism was something I was prepared to sacrifice,8221; he said.

The film tells the story of Jack8217;s induction and military training; depicts the Kiplings8217; squirearchal lifestyle at Bateman8217;s, their Jacobean manor house in Sussex. It builds rapidly to an extended trench warfare sequence, then hurls the soldiers onto the battlefield, where Jack soon disappears and is reported missing.

Next comes the more sombre aftermath, when, as Rebecca Eaton, the film8217;s executive producer, put it, the Kiplings must face the 8220;unspeakable8221; possibility that they have lost a child, one they 8220;have purposely put in harm8217;s way.8221;

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The revelation of Jack8217;s fate comes with an added psychological dimension. Pvt. Michael Bowe Martin McCann, the sole survivor of Jack8217;s Irish platoon, arrives at Bateman8217;s and gives a shattering account of Jack8217;s last hours. The whole family achieves a measure of catharsis, and even the self-assured bard finally disintegrates into sobbing.

The real-life Kipling never broke down. And, it can be argued, he used his art to avoid the truth, versifying that his son 8220;was killed while laughing at some jest8221; and that at least 8220;he did not shame his kind.8221; No one really knows how Jack died.

Asked if he thought Kipling would have liked My Boy Jack, Haig replied, 8220;He would have resented any deepish investigation into his family.8221; But he said he liked to think Kipling would have found a 8220;generosity of spirit and sensitivity8221; in the film.

Kipling might have been quite pleased by what is, after all, a meta-Kipling yarn. Like Harvey, the adolescent hero of Captains Courageous, Jack transcends a cosseted boyhood to become part of a manly, rigorous corps, inspiring his somewhat hapless Irish recruits, besting them in push-ups and, despite weak eyesight, in marksmanship as well. Later he leads them valiantly 8220;over the top8221; and dies almost as heroically as Akela, the venerable wolf chieftain in the first Jungle Book.
-ROBERT F. MOSS NYT