Its a game of three thirds well a film of three Thirds anyway.

I watched this as I from Manchester and the film is set in Manchester so it peaked my interest. Firstly it has a Film Noir kind of vibe about it but to be fair that is kind of what Manchester is like, its a bit rainy and dark and grey and full of old buildings and at night the neon shines brightly against low lit streets.

The film captures this really well so credit to the makers for that. I can't really fault anything in terms of its production etc. The acting was sound nothing outstanding, pretty solid but at times hammy.

The lighting and cinematography was again well done but nothing spectacular, Sound was again good. So overall a solid production.

The film is kind of spread over 3 thirds and I don't want to give away spoilers so will keep things as spoiler free as possible.

The first third ( we will call it the start ) serves as an introduction to the 2 main leads a young man and a girl. I found problems with this as the friendship progresses way to quickly. For me it needed more time to develop before moving to the next stage. Also the first third needed a catalyst or a mysterious element to keep you wondering where it was heading. Nothing major just something to peak the interest a little. Also one scene where a drunken fat lad shout aright darling and grabs a girl and instantly pulls her rather than get a stiletto to the head was really dumb and stupid ( I know Manchester i've seen Stilettoes to the head for much less " The good thing about the first third was that it set the tone and had some great outdoor shots of the streets of Manchester and just about ( only just ) keeps you interested for the second third ( lets call it the middle )

The second Third is when things really start to kick in, while the start was a bit slow and off pace the middle shows us where the film is heading. Now this is where they could have really gone balls to the wall and ramped it up a notch, which they did try to do but I mean come on. Get that music ramped up, add more cuts mess with the lighting etc. Get people out of their comfort zone and push it all a bit harder. The semi erotic scenes they tried to enact didn't really work as intended and I think a lot of that was just simply down to editing and lack of ambition. Still it wasn't bad just too understated.

On to the final third ( which I am going to call the Ending ) This is where there should have been the most tension and/or emotion etc. Unfortunately once again the pacing and editing were all wrong and it all just meandered along and lacked either emotion or tension. There could have however been something beautiful in there, a message, a revelation or just someone anyone giving us something to really think about. Instead it just passes by and easily forgotten.

This could have been an 8 or 9 out of 10 small budget British film with a bit more daring and ambition.

Instead we have decent start but which misses out the key elements to a start, a middle which was good but could have been brilliant and an ending that is average and misses out the key elements of an ending.

One scene really stood out that I liked and where we finally got a bit of a performance from the lead about an hour in down an ally. What we needed was more of that but in relation to the Habit !!

This was another problem, the film is called habit and uses a plot element to depict a habit yet this was poorly explored and hardly touched upon when it should have been the entire focus. The opportunity for a metaphoric meaning within this was sorely missed.

I give it a 6/10 as a lot of it is faultless apart from the way it all game together in the end. A wasted opportunity in my eyes but still worth a watch as it has many very good elements to it.

This film is about a young man, with a sad family history consisting of suicide, parental abandonment and mental health issues, who finds a girl befriending him and taking him into a seedy world of sex parlors and cannibalism. He has to make a decision to become part of this group, who call themselves a family, or get out. The more he sees the more entrenched he becomes.

I'm not really one for cannibal horror. I did like the Hannibal Lecter series but I think it was due to how much psychology and intelligence played roles in the films. This isn't a very clever film. It relies a lot on the use of a sex parlor to draw their victims in and that just comes off kinda cheap to me. I would've prefered to have seen something a bit smarter than just the simple use of sex to catch prey. I mean, it works but it's just not very creative.

The quality of the film is not terribly bad. There were some scenes that leaned towards an artsy look. The actors seemed to be decent and the story was okay. There was some gore to it and they didn't mind rolling around in blood. So, if you are into blood covered boobs, this film has it.

All-in-all this isn't awful but it ain't great. Even though I don't care for cannibal movies, I want to be fair so I'm giving this 5 stars. If you like cannibal movies you may very well enjoy this much more than I did.

Tricky this one as I'm not sure I was watching the right movie. And i'm Definitely not the right audience.

Having said that I think it was well done on the whole, but the whole blood blood blood thing I feel is a little 'over', if you know what I mean.

Sure some kids in black shirts will love it, but I need my thrillers a little more well thought out.

The acting in Habit wasn't bad so that's already something but I can't say it's a satisfying movie. For that the story is a bit simple, not enough elaborated, even though the plot is pretty straightforward. It could have been better, now it's just about cannibals eating some random victims. They don't tell you why they do it, how they became like that and so on. The horror scenes are pretty gore so for the fans of that genre it's a good thing. For a low budget movie it isn't all that bad actually but it definitely could have been better storywise.

As far as low budget British films go, this is a good one. It's very bloody and full of sex so if that's your kind of thing you will enjoy it. Had some decent actors in it, young and old as well as a few recognisable faces from the British soaps. It's not too long and keeps you interested long enough to enjoy it.

A British horror; A story about a troubled young man who takes a job as a doorman at a massage parlour in Manchester and soon finds himself falling into a criminal underworld. This modern noir has a theme about personal misery where it meets a subversion of morality. With graphic brutality, violence, and repulsive characters on show, it does remain mercifully ungratuitous. But there isn't enough exposition to explain the character's motives for the events that unfold. Some of the performances are ungainly; while local dialect fits the setting, some characters are too crude. The dialogue is less than inspiring and with an overuse of profanities.

Stephen McGeagh has written and directed a grimy, messy horror film. You may imagine the title focuses on an addiction of some kind. Set in the rougher parts of Manchester, the drug in question may not be what you expect, although with this being a genre film, it might well be!

There's a strong cast at work here, convincing and likeable (well, some of them), and the revelations as to the nature of events are skillfully handled. Set against a rainy, urban backdrop, the unrelentingly grim future these characters are desperately trying to escape is all-enveloping. Whether Lee (Jessica Bardon) and Michael (Elliot James Langridge) do eventually find a way out from the lives that shackle them is not for me to say, but their journey is a shocking and bloody one, and 'Habit' is a film I enjoyed very much. My score is 8 out of 10.

Habit: Gritty urban horror set in Manchester. Michael meets Lee when she's fighting with a security guard at a Job Centre. She brings him into a strange circle based at her uncles massage club, Soon Michael witnesses a violent killing and is party to the cult like group's cannibalism. Pretty gruesome and dark, people being butchered and having chunks bitten out of them. Things get complicated when the cult crosses a gangster but we see that more than one club is preying on it's customers. Not a film for the squeamish and unlikely to be a hit with the Manchester Tourism Board. Written and directed by Simon Halligan. 7/10

Gross, mean, with wall-to-wall brutal sex and death, 'Habit' hasn't got too much going for it above and beyond the raw meat, man.

Cutie Lee 'accidentally' runs into haunted (by his mother's suicide) Michael down the benefits office, and lures him into the racy sex industry/cannibal cult scene.

Great, right ?

Partly.

All the ingredients we slaver over are here, especially Roxanne Pallet as a cannibal hooker, but something's missing . . Lack of style, maybe? Even a guts-spilt entry like this needs style, but it just kinda rolls on flat. Perhaps Manchester is full of nookie-dens where you don't survive the encounter; folk maybe take it in their stride (Unlikely? With Burnham as Mayor? Who knows . . ?) ?

'Habit' needs a boot up the gusset, in other words.

Many will be sated by a blood-drenched Pallett (now - awesomely! - 'Carrion' !!) in her undies, dashing down fresh flesh (cough!) with her eyes blazing and her bits wobbling . . And while Rox (a smoke-show, I don't care what anyone says) now distressingly claims to have left this stuff behind her . . 'Habit' deserves at least something raising for conferring on us such a heartwarming image as her legacy.

A great slice of genre film making, dark gritty with strong central performances.

A troubled young man living in Manchester, England, gets himself a cash in hand job working as a doorman at a seedy massage parlour (brothel) but finds himself mixed up with a cannibal sex cult. This film is a gritty, urban drama with strong horror elements of murder and cannibalism, an interesting idea but sadly it just did not really work for me. However it is well acted, has interesting characters, some very graphic gore and a fair bit of sex to make it worth watching.

A low-budget British horror that does what it says on the tin, but also manages to do it very well. The script is appalling and the cast struggle with cliched dialogue, but there are some fair to good actors here. Jessica Barden can do no wrong, while William Ash and Louis Emmerick are quite capable and even Roxanne Pallett manages an adequate performance. I did not know Elliot James Langridge before this but he can certainly emote. His character has a limited range of reactions, mostly miserable or lost, but when he is good he is very good. The weakest link is the sister, not due to poor acting but simply not a credible role. As we find out, her claustrophobic protection of her brother is accompanied by a personality that cannot look after herself.

The plot is slight - young man joins group of cannibals in Manchester after catching the eye of a young woman - but it bowls along merrily and has the feel of a more substantial piece. Ordinarily, to say a film seems longer than its run time would be an insult, but in this case it is a tribute to the pacing. Most of the action looks to take place in real locations rather than film sets, although the cheapness shows a few times - an industrial stone floor looks more like vinyl, for example - but the grime, squalor, poverty, deprivation and occasional bright lights of Manchester add atmosphere and authenticity.

There is no attempt to burden us with backstory, other than one incident in the childhood of the main character, which some might find unfulfilling but I didn't mind. We are seeing a snapshot, a few days in the lives of our hosts, not the grand sweep of history. How many of us question the background of everyone we meet?

Effects are a mixed bag. Some deliciously graphic butchery is mixed with pointless injury detail. If someone has the skill and the restraint to fillet and carve an entire leg, why would they inflict random diagonal cuts to the torso? These do not look like stab wounds so much as naff 1960s injuries that would have been at home in Peter Cushing portmanteau stories about crypt keepers or asylum managers.

Nudity too is inconsistent. Despite much of the story taking place in a seedy massage parlour (don't look for cameos by international sports stars with calf sprains), the presentation is actually surprisingly coy until a topless cabaret artist introduces a scene featuring a group of people writhing naked and drenched in blood. It is as if the film were composed of elements made by entirely different studios, then stitched together without editing: one crew to make the horror sequences, one to do the erotic one, one to capture seedier areas of Manchester (which is almost a character in itself).

The film would never challenge at the Oscars but it is a solid effort and deserves to be seen. Do not be put off by the lack of big names, although Barden is growing in stature (figuratively) with every film. She is far from statuesque but her deadpan face can portray big feelings with barely a twitch as she fills the screen with bland nihilism. Worth a watch.

Bizarrely, this feels like a '60s Northern Kitchen Sink Drama, but with a bit more death, gore and sex. It meanders somewhat, fails to engage and adds up to a total waste of your time. Avoid.