While She Was Out

It’s impossible not to feel a twinge of disappointment at just how mediocre While She Was Out inevitably becomes, as the film boasts a seemingly can’t-miss premise that’s slowly-but-surely squandered by filmmaker Susan Montford. The movie follows battered housewife Della Myers (Kim Basinger) as she heads to a local mall for some last minute Christmas shopping, with her decision to leave a note on a badly-parked car raising the ire of a gun-toting street tough named Chuckie (Lukas Haas). Along with his three friends (Jamie Starr’s Huey, Leonard Wu’s Vingh, and Luis Chavez’s Tomas), Chuckie pursues Della into the nearby woods and forces the frightened mother-of-two into a deadly game of cat and mouse. There’s little doubt that While She Was Out suffers from a pervasive atmosphere of incompetence that’s most potently reflected in Basinger’s unusually awful performance, with the actress’ inability to convincingly slip into the skin of her vulnerable character ensuring that Della remains as unsympathetic and purely implausible a figure as one could envision. It is, as a result, almost impossible to work up any interest or enthusiasm in the back-and-forth conflict that dominates much of the film’s running time, as Basinger’s oddly tentative work prevents the viewer from buying into her character’s total domination over her pursuers (ie it becomes increasingly difficult to believe that Della would be able to single-handedly take out four armed thugs). And although the movie does possess one or two admittedly compelling moments – ie Chuckie lures Della out of her hiding place by threatening her loved ones, Star Wars/Judgment Night style – While She Was Out is simply unable to live up to the relatively promising nature of its set-up. (And this is to say nothing of Haas’ egregiously over-the-top turn as the villain, with the actor’s apparent decision to channel Edward Furlong’s work in the first Terminator sequel nothing short of baffling.)

** out of ****