Habit (1995) by Larry Fessenden

Director: Larry Fessenden

Year: 1995

Country: USA

Alternate Titles: N/A

Genre: Vampire

Plot:

After meeting at a local party, a man becomes infatuated with an enigmatic woman and tries to get with her, eventually starting a romance with her, which drags him into a series of bizarre encounters that cause him to believe she’s a vampire and must decide how to handle the relationship.

Review:

Overall, this was a troublesome if watchable genre effort. Among the more likable factors present here is the rather intriguing central setup that provides this with some immensely fun character work over the first half. With this one going in-depth on their relationship and providing the kind of intriguing characterizations where we get to know how he’s presented as the down-on-his-luck alcoholic in a bad relationship who becomes far more drawn to the mysterious woman he meets at a party that is the exact opposite of his current girlfriend, forcing him to go along with the new romance in a logical manner. It’s only after several dates and hookups together that her odd behavior and strange ticks, from the aversion to daytime meetings, a disdain for local cuisine, and even biting to the point of bloodletting during sex, that eventually becomes obvious about what she really is. That this is nicely tied into the idea of whether it’s all in his head or not due to his issues makes everything feel that much more intriguing, with the whole thing taking on an unreliable narrator approach, which helps this tremendously.

There are some big issues here that keep this one down. The most egregious of these is the absolutely sluggish pacing that renders just about anything nearly impossible to get behind. So little happens here that its tone and presentation come across more as a low-rent indie drama about a man coming into a new relationship with a strange woman and trying to get used to her eccentric behavior, which is all decent enough as a concept, but leaves this with such a lack of action that it’s easy to grow bored with this one. Watching this barely-coherent, unkept, alcoholic schlub of a person complain about his new relationship with a quirky enough but still not all that obvious of a target for the type of behavior he exhibits towards it all, and with this all taking up the majority of a bloated, egregiously and unnecessary overlong running time, it just drags the film to a halt more than anything else. As well, since this doesn’t render much in the way of traditional vampiric activity or action, there’s not much that will appeal to more traditionally-minded genre fans who will be bored senseless waiting for something to happen, being another factor bringing it down.

Overview: **.5/5

An intriguing if somewhat flawed genre effort, this one works much better as a fan of the style more than anything else, as this is a fairly straightforward, one-note type of feature without much to change that. This is solely for those who appreciate this type of unconventional approach to the genre, while more traditionally-minded viewers who are turned off by the flaws will want to heed extreme caution.