Habit

A vintage newscaster announces, quite cheerfully, that human consciousness has ended — the world is now full of "philosophical-zombies" who carry on their routines with nobody home. We meet one household: a man frozen on the couch, a woman lost in an endless makeup ritual, and their domestic robot quietly doing all the housework nobody notices. When a casserole tips off the man's lap, the robot catches it — competence with no one to see it. It's then flagged that the kitchen apron is "required for dishwashing," and puts it on. It never comes off. When the man sheds his ugly reindeer sweater outside in the snow, the robot dons it too — over the apron. Also never comes off. Then a tacky 80s shopping-channel ad interrupts, and the robot starts "upgrading its style" — piling on a sequined gown, a parka, a negligee, a trilby, a cravat — one absurd costume layer at a time, always with the gingham apron hem and reindeer sweater peeking out underneath. A ridiculous formal dinner service is the climax: the robot, dressed in everything it has ever acquired, serves the meal in total deadpan gravity — mismatched socks and flip-flops visible under the table. Finally, the robot retreats to a storage room and the film ends on a slow, indifferent pan across a row of identical spare robots — all bare, all the same — until it reaches ours: dressed head to toe in his absurd accumulated finery, casually adjusting a brooch as the camera passes him exactly as it passed the others. Fade to black. Title: HABIT. The film's comic engine: nothing is ever pruned. Everything acquired simply stays — literalized as a joke about routines, identity, and things we never let go of.