'Dark Knight'-'Toy Story' recut trailer

09:17 AM PT, Oct 9 2008

The "recut" movie trailer is nothing new. Take a popular film, open your amateur video editing software of choice, and then cut, rearrange, remix and re-dub. By the end, you should have something markedly different and hopefully entertaining, ready to broadcast around the Web.

The trend has brought us a collection of clever clips, such as the silly, high school comedy "American Pie" as a horror flick or the silly, high school comedy "Superbad" turned epic drama. Probably the most memorable is "The Shining" recut, which remixes the frightening film into a romantic comedy. Because this genre has been so exhausted, a new entry is almost never worth mentioning.

But seriously, the "Dark Knight"-"Toy Story" recut is excellent. Starring Christian Bale as Buzz Lightyear, the late Heath Ledger as Woody and, naturally, Morgan Freeman as Mr. Potatohead, the casting is brilliant and the editing fantastic. My only gripe is the lack of Maggie Gyllenhall as Bo Peep, but to be fair, I've drawn the conclusion that just about every video would benefit from more Maggie G.

The "Batman meets Buzz" video isn't the only Dark Knight spoof that's seen popularity lately (nor is it even the first we've written about). One YouTube user late last month injected a bit of political satire into a scene from the movie. "The Dark Bailout" pokes fun at the $700-billion aid given to the U.S. financial sector. It's a funny, smart short, but I somehow don't think even the Joker could come up with the perfect solution for that riddle.

-- Mark Milian