Tara Fitzgerald

Actress Tara Fitzgerald is probably best known for her role in "Brassed Off".

But in her latest film, she's swapped the collieries of northern England for the skies of the south during the Battle of Britain.

The film has been a huge hit in the Czech Republic

Tara Fitzgerald was on the programme to talk about her new film, "Dark Blue World." To watch her interview in full, click on the watch/listen box on the top right hand side of this story.

"Dark Blue World" tells the story of a squadron of Czech pilots, who flee the German invasion of their homeland and join the RAF.

It's a classic love triangle, directed by the Oscar-winning Czech director, Jan Sverak.

Two Czech pilots, the worldly Franta (Ondrej Vetchy) in his thirties, and his hot-headed protege Karel (Krystof Hadek), barely out of his teens, escape to Britain together.

During re-training on an RAF base, both fall for an Englishwoman, Susan (Tara Fitzgerald), whose husband is missing in action.

These scenes are intercut with passages from 1950, where Franta is detained in a Czech labour camp as an enemy of the people - all because he had been a fighter pilot with the Allies.

Tara Fitzgerald told Breakfast:

It's been a huge hit in the Czech Republic.

It's opened a can of worms for the Czech people, because what happened during the war - with Czech pilots working for the Allies - wasn't talked about for years.

After the Putsch (when the Communists took over, in the late forties) quite a lot of fliers escaped back to the West.

Many of those who didn't were interned in concentration camps and stayed there until the md-sixties. They were just forgotten about.

Dark Blue World goes on general release from today (May 10)