Jack Nicholson, please step aside: The world is getting ready for a new Joker in Heath Ledger. For now, the "Brokeback Mountain" star is practicing his grins -- but also putting the finishing touches on a final film or two before going toe-to-toe with Christian Bale's Batman. "It'll be sometime [in the middle of] next year," Ledger said about when he'll start shooting "The Dark Knight" with "Batman Begins" director Christopher Nolan. In preparation for the first supervillain role of his career, the Oscar nominee could only divulge that he isn't looking to Nicholson, Cesar Romero or any other Joker predecessor as a model. "I'm refusing to think about it yet," he insisted. "I'm just happy at home and I haven't given it too much thought." Then, grinning like Jack Napier himself, Ledger did make one evil-sounding statement: "I've got something up my sleeve," he promised. ...

"McClane residence, Lucy McClane speaking." It's a fairly obscure phrase from a fairly awesome action flick from nearly 20 years ago, and now 21-year-old up-and-comer Mary Elizabeth Winstead is studying it intensely as she shoots the fourth "Die Hard" flick. Winstead is playing the grown-up daughter of Bruce Willis' John McClane character. "I answer the phone: 'This is Lucy McClane,' " Winstead laughed, referring to the brief role she'll have in June's "Live Free or Die Hard." "I am trying to [channel her], I really am. I've got the hair down, I think," the "Final Destination 3" actress grinned. Winstead added that, unlike Bonnie Bedelia's Holly in the earlier films, Lucy won't be spending the whole movie waiting to be saved. "I get in the action a little bit," she revealed. "I do get to fight, and I get to be tough -- which I'm happy about. I'm not just the damsel in distress." ...

It's been months since it was announced that Wilmer Valderrama would be squeezing into Erik Estrada's skin-tight khaki uniform and mirror sunglasses for the role of Ponch in the upcoming "CHiPs" movie. Fans of the classic cop TV series have been asking one question ever since: Who's gonna be Jon? "I know that it's going to be a friend of mine," Valderrama said cryptically this week, possibly instigating a fight to the death between Topher Grace and Ashton Kutcher. "We're in pre-production right now, and we're looking to film sometime next year." The script for the film is a "Starsky & Hutch"-like spoof of the friendship between a by-the-book white cop and his hard-partying Latino partner, and the "That '70s Show" star said he can't wait to take on the most high-profile role of his young career. "There's two projects I have to do before 'CHiPs,' but 'CHiPs' is going to happen," he said excitedly, adding that an announcement of Jon's identity should be coming soon. "We're talking to a few people," the star said, implying that he has more friends in the running than just long-rumored "Fantastic Four" star Chris Evans. "We're thinking aloud. I couldn't give you the name yet." ...

One of the best-regarded directors in the biz now has a new home: Martin Scorsese has signed a four-year, first-look deal with Paramount Pictures that will have the legendary filmmaker overseeing everything from movies to DVDs and even television for the studio. It's Scorsese's first overall pact in several years. ... In a career that's spanned four decades, Dustin Hoffman has dressed as everyone from a man in woman's clothing to Captain Hook. So, as the eccentric and ancient Mr. Magorium in next year's fantastically titled "Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium," Hoffman was able to teach first-time director Zach Helm an important lesson: Clothes don't make the man. "The first thing we did when we sat down and talked, we agreed on what we didn't want," Hoffman remembered. "I said, 'You know, this guy's 243 and, when I did [1970's] 'Little Big Man' -- where [Jack Crabb, a different character] was 121 -- that was a five-hour make-up. I know the constraints of that: You can't see the person." The double-Oscar winner, who was 30 when he played Benjamin Braddock in 1967's "The Graduate," believes that age, like most things in film, simply comes down to acting. "How are you going to ascertain what you look like at 243 anyway?" Hoffman asked. "[We agreed it's more about] how can we find a character in which you will accept the fact that he's 243 if he says he is? And I found a character." The film centers on Natalie Portman's Molly Mahoney, who comes into the possession of a magical toy emporium owned by Hoffman's ancient proprietor. ...

While it's true that story is king at Pixar, that doesn't mean that the boys behind animation's biggest hits don't also get excited by their own brand-new toys. Next on display is "Ratatouille," starring a Parisian mouse who wants to become a world-class chef. "We've made some new technological breakthroughs with ['Ratatouille'], and it's so exciting to see that," said John Lasseter, Pixar creative chief and director of the recent hit "Cars." "The characters are more animated than anything you've seen in computer animation before." Following the metallic sheen of Lightning McQueen and his hot-rod friends, Pixar has shifted its gaze to realistically rendering organic material instead. "One of the real technical challenges with that there is something called squash and stretch," he explained. "A bouncing ball as it hits the ground maintains the same volume, [but] it squashes then stretches as it goes up. A really organic character is so hard to do in computer animation, because computer animation is a rigid model. You kind of [have to] bend around it to get that superficiality." Directed by Brad Bird ("The Incredibles"), "Ratatouille" will serve up its dish next summer. ...

Most of us would give our right arm to spend a romantic weekend in Paris -- but then again, most of us don't have to worry about running into trouble while we're there. For Adam Goldberg, who stars in the upcoming "Two Days," the wrong sorts of people are those who used to know his character's girlfriend, who is played in the film by French actress Julie Delpy. "We play a couple trying to reinfuse our relationship in her hometown of Paris, and everything goes wrong," Goldberg said. "We keep meeting her ex-boyfriends, and her parents don't speak any English and I don't speak any French. It just turns into a romantic disaster." Delpy has treaded similar ground before, walking around Paris with Ethan Hawke in Richard Linklater's "Before Sunset." So, is "Two Days" -- which was also written and directed by Delpy -- a bizarro-world sequel? "You could say that, I mean that would sort of be the underbelly of it," added the "Saving Private Ryan" star. "But it's also not just the two of us. It's much more of an ensemble cast. We've been saying it's 'Meet the Parents' crossed with 'Eyes Wide Shut.' " The quirky romantic flick is due in theaters in the spring. ...

Step aside, Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie: Fifty-two-year-old actress Catherine O'Hara is about to become the wildest lady in show business. The "Best in Show" veteran will lend her voice to a monster in Spike Jonze's adaptation of the classic children's book "Where the Wild Things Are." She's promising the transformation from page to screen will be flawless -- even though she hasn't seen any of the footage yet. "The Wild Things you see in the book -- that's our look," O'Hara assured. "Ultimately we're the voices of the Wild Things, but we workshopped these characters for a couple of weeks on camera, so they shot us as a reference for the puppetry or the effects that would follow. They were making these 8-foot puppets with people inside them, but I really don't know what they settled on. They've tried a lot of different things." O'Hara will also be joined by a formidable cast of aspiring monsters. "I'm playing one that looks like an older female, and Michelle Williams is the younger-looking female," she described. "Then James Gandolfini and Forest Whitaker -- he and I are kind of a couple in it." O'Hara is currently transforming herself into something of an Oscar-season monster, with an impressive performance in the soon-to-be-released "For Your Consideration," another mockumentary from longtime collaborator Christopher Guest.

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