Carrey rhymes his way back into Dr. Seuss world; pig-nosed Ricci makes grown men cry in ’Penelope.’

On the 14th day of March, in the Jungle of Nool/ In the heat of the day, in the cool of the pool/ We’ve got news for you, try not to be wary: There’s another darn Seuss movie from comic Jim Carrey. "At the moment I’m doing a cartoon version of ’Horton Hears a Who,’ which is going to be beautiful," the "Grinch" star recently announced. "Audrey Geisel, Dr. Seuss’ widow, liked what I did [on the ’Grinch’] and she asked me to [voice] Horton." According to Carrey, "Horton," the story of an elephant who discovers a microscopic world and must protect it from his neighbors, contains big, Seussian truths. "I love the idea that a person is a person no matter how small, and the idea of worlds within worlds within worlds," the "Ace Ventura" star said. "Sometimes I sit out in my backyard and a hummingbird will come down, whap! right past my head. And I realize that it’s his property, as far as he’s concerned. We think we’re the ones in control [but we’re not]." "Horton Hears a Who" opens on March 14, 2008. ...

What does it take to make Hollywood’s biggest badass shed a tear? Apparently, Christina Ricci in a prosthetic pig nose. "I have a movie called ’Penelope’ coming out in April," Ricci said of her next project, a fantasy tale about a cursed girl with a swine’s snout. "It’s a fairy tale, but it’s pretty touching." The flick, which is produced by and co-stars Reese Witherspoon, is so touching, in fact, that an advance screening recently made none other than Samuel L. Jackson break down in tears. "It’s so touching and great," grinned Jackson, a friend of Ricci’s who co-stars with her in "Black Snake Moan." "Sam cried at the screening," teased Ricci, while Jackson could only reply, "I love that movie." Get your Kleenex ready, as "Penelope" hits theaters April 6. ...

Mark Ruffalo is looking to ruffle a few feathers with his next flick, a drama based on a true story called "The Brass Wall" that might arrive just in time to tarnish the image of a presidential contender. "I don’t think he realizes quite how close it’s going to come," the "Zodiac" star said of Rudy Giuliani, who is due to announce his Republican candidacy any day now. "[Our film] is about an undercover organized-crime detective in New York City in the early ’90s who starts to investigate one thing and then it opens up into this huge police corruption scandal that reaches all they way up to Giuliani, who’s running for office at this time," he said of the former New York mayor and his alleged connection to a situation involving the Lucchesi crime family and the death of a firefighter. Based on the controversial book of the same name by New York Times reporter David Kocieniewski, "Wall" is expected to begin filming this year - just in time to possibly bring an alleged skeleton back into the daylight. "They never went after [Giuliani] because they wanted to focus. They thought it would become too sprawling," Ruffalo said of the real-life investigation. "But now that we’re making the movie, we’re privy to much more information than they were printing back then. And he has his hands all over this thing." ...

Santa, baby! "Daddy’s Little Girls" star Gabrielle Union told MTV News her next flick is a modernized Christmas classic. "Last I heard it was called ’The Perfect Christmas,’ " Union reported. "It’s kind of a re-imagining of ’Miracle on 34th Street,’ with an urban, hip-hop edge." The original was a tearjerker that followed a department-store Santa who claimed to be the real deal, but Union said her remake has an entirely different tone. "It’s hilarious," she insisted. "We’ve got Queen Latifah and Terrence Howard [as Mr. Bah Humbug]. Charlie Murphy plays my husband." Be good, for goodness sake, "The Perfect Christmas" opens November 30. ...

Get on your chairs and let out your wildest screams, because "There’s a rat in every restaurant," proclaimed Emmy-winner Brad Garrett, who should know - he’s the one who brought them there. "I play Chef Gusteau, who is the dead owner of the restaurant where the rats congregate," Garrett said of his role in the upcoming Pixar release "Ratatouille," the story of Remy, a Parisian rat voiced by Patton Oswalt, whose greatest ambition is to become a top chef. "I come back as an apparition to help Remy with his cooking." Does that make Garrett like other great movie teachers? "I’m [definitely] the Obi-Wan," Garrett joked. "Except because of my size, I’m the Obi-Three." The Brad Bird- and Jan Pinkava-directed flick scurries into theaters June 29. ...

Looking for a baffler? Try parsing out the story of "Nobel Son," a new film starring Alan Rickman, Danny DeVito, Eliza Dushku and "Alpha Dog" actor Shawn Hatosy. "I love this movie, it’s really cool," Hatosy said, breaking into a quiet laugh. "But it’s a hard one to talk about because the plot is all over the place. Alan Rickman plays a scientist and Bryan Greenberg plays a guy who studies cannibalism, so it’s kind of an analogy between the two. It’s a strange film." Even if he doesn’t necessarily understand the whole thing, Hatosy told MTV News about one scene that he jokingly said he hopes needs no explanation. "I play Alan Rickman’s half-son, he doesn’t know that he’s his son," Hatosy said as a wicked smile broke across his face. "And there’s a scene where I’m forced to eat Eliza Dushku and her boob." Hatosy makes the strangest trip ever to "second base" in late ’07. ...

"It’s a 21st century ’Dirty Dozen,’ " "Zodiac" scribe James Vanderbilt said of his new film, "The Losers," a "total action picture" based on a limited-run comic book series by "the mad genius and conspiracy theorist Andy Diggle." "It’s about a group of special-forces guys who get framed by this drugged-out, rogue CIA agent and have to figure out how to clear their names in a post-9/11 world," he explained. "Five guys who basically lost everything, but are still hard-boiled American patriots and are going to save the country from its government." Director Peter Berg, who previously worked with Vanderbilt on "The Rundown," will helm the project, which is currently being rewritten for Warner Bros. for a 2008 release.