Irish film loses out in the States

The goblins, elves and fairies failed to work their magic for Ella Enchanted, the Irish-filmed production starring Anne Hathaway and Vivica A. Fox.

The movie lost out badly on its Stateside release hammered by a revival in Mel Gibson's runaway hit, The Passion of the Christ.

Ella struggled into 9th place in the Box Office rankings with an opening week-end take of only $6.1m.

The Passion, made for $27m, has hit the $354.9m mark.

Interestingly, it was beaten into second place in Ireland ... by Scooby Doo 2!