Which of these are you going to watch?

March will be an unrelenting month for moviegoers, starting off with many of the main Oscar contenders to coincide with the prestigious awards show taking place earlier in the month.

March also sees the Iranian Film Festival, and some of the most anticipated titles of the year from local and Hollywood blockbusters.

The holiday season may be over but there's going to be no break from these movies not to miss in March!

Winchester

After the death of her husband and their child, Sarah Winchester, widow and heiress to the Winchester arms fortune builds a mysterious mansion that is a puzzling maze of doors and walls. Believed that she is haunted by the spirits of those killed from a Winchester arms, a doctor is hired to evaluate her sanity to see if she can still remain as a proprietor of the massive arms business. Based on the real Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California, the setting alone would seem to be perfect fodder for a run-of-mill haunted house horror, as one would expect from the Spierig Brothers who last directed 2017's "Jigsaw". However, "Winchester" got a lot more prestigious when it managed to nab Oscar-winner Helen Mirren to be in the leading role as the reclusive Winchester widow. Not that it automatically makes it a far better film than the potential of its material, but it's not every day you would get to see an actor of such caliber taking on a horror role.

General Release Date: 1 March

Lady Bird

Growing up in a small town of Sacramento and studying in a Catholic high school, Christine McPherson dreams of leaving for New York and creates a new identity for herself as Lady Bird. Young Saoirse Ronan is back again with another performance that puts her in the Oscar race since "Brooklyn". This time teaming up with indie darling Greta Gerwig, who wrote and directed this coming of age story from her experience as a Sacramento native, this has produced one of the main contenders for this Oscar race with 5 nominations from Best Leading Actress, Best Supporting Actress, Best Original Screenplay, Best Director and in the running for Best Picture.

General Release Date: 1 March

Red Sparrow

Russian ballerina Dominika Egorova is forced to join the "Sparrow School", a Russian intelligence service where agents are trained to use their body as a weapon. When Dominika is assigned to expose a CIA agent within the Russian ranks, she considers becoming a double agent. Based on the novel of the same name written by a retired CIA agent who plans to spin out an entire trilogy, this project was once about to be handed to Darren Aronofsky and David Fincher to have Rooney Mara to star. This could very much be Jennifer Lawrence's "Atomic Blonde" (co-starring with an equally admired Joel Edgerton) and reunites her with "The Hunger Game: Mockingjay" director Francis Lawrence who knows how to bring out her action chops.

General Release Date: 2 March

Girls Vs Gangsters

As one of the trio is getting married, Jialan, Xiwen, and Kimmy decide to have a hen party in Vietnam. After a night of drinking and celebration, they all wake up buried in the sand and come in possession of a briefcase filled with gold. After breaking records in China and Hong Kong in 2014, director Barbara Wong has seem to become the leading director of feminist power for the Chinese lady. Bringing back the beauties of Janine Chun, Ivy Yi and Fiona Sit on a trip that closely resembles "The Hangover II", this could be another wild adventure with the trio.

General Release Date: 2 March

Tomb Raider

As the "Cradle of Life" ended with the death of the franchise, this new "Tomb Raider" is based off the 2013 rebooted video game franchise. "Tomb Raider" will also be a reboot of the cinematic franchise that starred Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft, replaced by another Oscar-winner, Alicia Vikander, to play as the titular role in this origin story of her first expedition to complete her father's research, played by Dominic West. This would also be a more character-driven venture with Walton Goggins, Daniel Wu and Kristin Scott Thomas also starring.

General Release Date: 8 March

The Post

With "Spotlight" being the winner for the Best Picture Oscar in 2016, Steven Spielberg could be thinking that a newspaper drama could be the ticket to get him the Oscar that he's been trying since 2006. Bringing back his "Bridge of Spies" star, Tom Hanks, to work with Oscar-great Meryl Streep for their first time together, "The Post" was an outing that wanted Oscar attention, and managed to nab two nominations including the Best Picture. Based on the events that prompted The Washington Post and The New York Times to published the Pentagon Papers, that would eventually led to the Watergate Scandal, this might be not be a secured Oscar win for Spielberg (but even less for Meryl Streep), but still a must watch for some heroic journalism.

General Release Date: 8 March

Marlina The Murderer in Four Acts

Marlina is a widow who lives alone in Sumba. When a group of robbers try to rob her house, she kills one of them named Markus and keeps his head. As Marlina is haunted by the headless spirit, the other robbers try to recover the head to give Markus a proper burial. Shooting for the first time outside the metropolitan landscapes of Jakarta, director Mouly Surya goes on a spiritual Indonesian western with "Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts". This was Indonesia's first movie in 12 years to be invited to the Cannes Film Festival, where it was showcased in the Director's Fortnight.

General Release Date: 8 March

A Wrinkle in Time

Adapted for the silver screen for the first time from the Madalein L'Engle novel of the same name, the daughter of a missing astrophysicist travels through time and space with her friends when she learns that her father was trapped in a distant planet. Coming off from the empowerment of black filmmakers in "Black Panther" is another milestone for black filmmakers. Indie director Ava DuVernay becomes the first woman of color to helm a production with a budget of over $100 million which would undoubtedly be lavished with spectacular visuals and costumes wore by the likes of Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon and Mind Kaling. Also in the cast are Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Michael Pena, Zach Galifianakis and Chris Pine, with Storm Reid possibly making a breakthrough with such a major role.

General Release Date: 8 March

Lee Chong Wei

For years we have been wanting a Malaysian sports movie around badminton, and 2018 could not have picked a better subject to center the movie on; our very own world champion Lee Chong Wei. Based off his biography that starts from his impoverish life to becoming a world champion, "Lee Chong Wei" has employed some of the very best to be the best badminton movie it can be. Despite having 2 complete newcomers out of over thousand who auditioned for the titular role, they will be surrounded by the respected names of Yeo Yann Yann, Singapore's Mark Lee, and Rosyam Nor in the cast, while being directed by Teng Bee who also directed the "Kepong Gangster" series. This is hopefully the Malaysian movie that will have us united in the cinema, as Lee Chong Wei does for us on the court.

General Release Date: 15 March

Pacific Rim: Uprising

March is certainly the month for big mechs. If you are looking for nostalgia, there's "Mazinger Z: Infinity" which is a 3D animated feature that takes place 10 years from the original series. However, one sequel that we've been wanting is to 2013's "Pacific Rim". Also taking place 10 years after its former installation, the Kaijus have returned to the world in "Pacific Rim: Uprising" as new Jaegers are deployed to defend humanity once again. This will be the feature directorial debut for "Daredevil" showrunner Steven D. Knight, who has taken over the duties from Guillermo del Toro (for a very good reason), with a mostly new cast starring John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny, Jing Tian, and only Charlie Day and Rinko Kikuchi reprising.

General Release Date: 22 March

The Shape of Water

Inspired as a child since watching the unfulfilled romance of the "Creature from the Black Lagoon", director Guillermo del Toro turned it into a 13 Oscar nomination picture that is undeniably the strongest contender for this year's Oscars. Even with all the award attention, Gullermo' labour of love shines through from the cast led by Sally Hawkins as a mute cleaner in a top secret facility where a river god is kept. Doug Jones gets his finest hour as the creature in the costume, supported by a whole host of A-listers from Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins to Octavia Spencer, all of who have received critical praises if not award nominations. With music composed by Alexander Desplat, this is the movie that Guillermo gave up "Pacific Rim: Uprising" for, and cinemas and fans of Guillermo's fantastical side have been waiting to see "The Shape of Water", whether it wins anything at the Oscars.

General Release Date: 22 March

Ready Player One

March will have two sides of Steven Spielberg. With "The Post" more catered to the more serious side of Spielberg, fans of his blockbuster sensibilities will be getting an overloaded kick out of "Ready Player One". Adapted from the Ernest Cline novel of a dystopian future where the impoverish population logs into a virtual world to escape from their reality, the young protagonist is on a race to inherit a massive fortune from the creator of the virtual world if only he can overcome a series of challenges called "Anorak's Game". While movies nowadays have plenty of easter eggs stowed away for the sharpest eyes, "Ready Player One" is unabashedly awash with references for those who grew up in the 80s and 90s. Tyler Sheridan leads as the youthful treasure seeker, but all eyes are definitely watching if they can catch all the pop cultural icons that will be sharing the same screen space, made real by the works of Industrial Light & Magic.

General Release Date: 29 March