Oscar-winning actor Sir Mark Rylance has backed the controversial white poppy movement which argues Remembrance Sunday should be ‘decolonised’.
Sir Mark, who featured in the World War II film Dunkirk, said next Sunday’s event should ‘refocus our every effort to avert war’.
The star, 65, has joined the Peace Pledge Union’s (PPU) campaign and will launch its new project Every Casualty Counts, Memorial 2025.
In a social media post by the PPU, Sir Mark said: ‘Remembrance Day should be a day to remember and grieve the great losses caused by war, but it should also be a day to refocus our every effort to avert war with all our tools of peaceful reconciliation of conflict.
‘Too often in my life, Remembrance Day seems a kind of shoulder shrug that war is inevitable. I do not believe it is.’
He told the Telegraph he has ‘always deeply admired’ the meaning behind the white poppy, which he said focusses on the innocent lives that were killed at war, which ‘now far outnumber the tragic military casualties’.
Sir Mark insisted the white poppy is not worn in opposition to the traditional red version, which is displayed in remembrance of military casualties.
Oscar-winning actor Mark Rylance pictured wearing a white poppy. The star has backed the controversial movement, which says Remembrance Sunday should be ‘decolonised’
But one military officer described the actor’s stance as a ‘gut punch’, saying it ‘belittles’ soldiers who ‘paid the ultimate sacrifice’.
Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon said: ‘Mark is very happy to take money to perform in a film like Dunkirk, but then just spits in the face of veterans still serving by wearing a white poppy.’
He added that the red poppy represents the blood of all those who died in the First World War while also honouring the deaths of civilians.
Colonel de Bretton-Gordon said Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Putin both viewed civilians as participants in war.
‘[Putin] is trying to kill as many civilians as possible in Ukraine… You shouldn’t differentiate,’ he added. ‘I can’t express it more determinedly how much I abhor this white poppy lot.’
Wearers of the white poppy, which was introduced in 1933, say it acts as a symbol of remembrance of all victims of war, regardless of their nationalities.
This year’s focus for the National Alternative Remembrance Ceremony held by the PPU is looking at ‘catastrophic loss of life in wars over the past year’.
Rylance pictured in 2017’s Dunkirk with Kenneth Branagh. He said next Sunday’s event should ‘refocus our every effort to avert war’
The PPU said civilian deaths have increased over the last three years, mainly thanks to the violence in Gaza and Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the Royal British Legion (RBL), which hands out the red poppy, said: ‘The RBL defends the right to wear different poppies, and we welcome all conversations about the meaning of the poppy and the different ways people choose to remember.
‘Our charitable objects are to support those who have served in the British Armed Forces, and their families, and the RBL’s red poppy recognises their service and sacrifice in defence of peace, democracy, and freedom.’
Sir Mark won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor while starring alongside Tom Hanks in Steven Spielberg‘s Cold War spy thriller Bridge of Spies.
