Review Category: DVD/Blu Ray

There are films that stand the test of time, and normally, critics and audiences cite movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood as key examples, such as Gone With The Wind, Singin’ in the Rain, Citizen Kane and so on. But, the one film that deserves to stand alongside those rare gems as one of the greatest cinematic masterpieces ever made in the history of cinema is 1938’s The Adventures of Robin Hood, directed by the duo team of Michael Curtiz and William Keighley. Despite the fact that there have been many cinematic interpretations of the Saxon nobleman over the years ranging from good (the excellent 1991 Prince of Thieves) to bad (Ridley Scott’s 2010 garbage pile), this film IS the Robin Hood tale brought to life on the big screen. Nowadays, movies feel the need to be dark, bleak and gritty because apparently that is what Hollywood feels is trendy with modern day culture, yet the 2010 movie version demonstrated that taking that approach would make for bland and joyless storytelling; with this movie, everything is merry and lighthearted, good-willed and witty, bold and tender, impudent and dashing, while also being brightly clad at the same time, which all plays key factors as to why this movie is an undoubted movie legend with an enduring legacy behind it.

 

The story on its own is pure escapist magic, including greedy bloodthirsty barons, a wicked usurper, a rightful king sent into exile, and a proud beauty that’s in distress… and, of course, at the centre of it all is England’s notorious outlaw hero, robbing from the rich just to give to the poor, and doing it all with a smile on his face and fending off foes in true swashbuckler style. But, most of all, this story understands the proper makings true hero; this wasn’t Luke Skywalker who got the medal at the end of Star Wars or got cheered like Harry Potter at the end of every movie, but was a man who strongly believed that what he was doing was right, was willing to stand and fight against oppression and tyranny, and would proudly die doing it while not caring if he was uncredited/forgotten or not. That is key as to why this interpretation of Robin Hood works so well and has resonated with audiences since its release nearly 80 years ago. The script sparkles throughout (huge credit to the writing trio of Norman Reilly Raine, Seton I. Miller and Rowland Leigh), has wonderful humour peppered throughout and is incredibly quotable (“May I obey all your commands with equal pleasure, sire!”).

 

Gorgeously presented in Technicolour, the colours are vibrant and pop out right at you, giving the film an eye-catching quality, while also having richness in texture, which is something that digitally-shot movies nowadays can’t even come close to accomplishing. Also, unlike the common stunts of modern cinema that’s littered with wire-fu or CGI, the stunts performed in this film are all for real and still keep you on the edge of your seat. While the story is gripping, the iconic music by Erich Wolfgang Korngold is legendary, brimming with rousing fanfare and full orchestral depth, it is no surprise the score was recognised with an Academy Award win.

 

One of the big fortunes this movie had was in its perfect casting across the board, and frankly, you can’t imagine a better Robin Hood than Errol Flynn. Flynn captures the humour, the vulnerability, the humanity and the determination that’s required to play that part, and even though Flynn stated that this was perhaps one of his most boring roles, it’s perhaps his best and most iconic one yet. Olivia de Havilland is also pitch-perfect as Marian, playing her as someone who stands by her own moral beliefs, and together with Flynn’s Robin, they constantly duel their way through what is the classic tempestuous romance; you have the prim and proper lady and the roguish outlaw risking both their lives in order to save each others. As Sir Guy of Gisbourne, Basil Rathbone gives a superb performance as the clever, yet arrogant arch-rival to Flynn’s Robin, and has a great rapport with Claude Rains’ pompous Prince John, both of them clashing for supremacy as the main villain of the piece. The rest of the supporting cast are all outstanding in their own right and give fully-committed performances all round, like Alan Hale Sr. as Little John or Melville Cooper as the High Sheriff of Nottingham.

 

It was evident that a tight, intelligent, well-written script was the real foundation for a film that proved to be a once in a lifetime true work of pure cinematic art. Both directors achieved what was possible with William Keighley bringing out the emotional weight and humanity, whilst Michael Curtiz handled the action with real style and panache. Every single thing about this movie succeeds across the board (from the writing, the casting, directing and so on), and when you have a movie that is THAT flawless, you do realise that what you are watching is a true masterpiece.

 

THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD / CERT: U / DIRECTORS: Michael Curtiz, William Keighley / SCREENPLAY: NORMAN REILLY RAINE, SETON I. MILLER, ROWLAND LEIGH / STARRING: ERROL FLYNN, OLIVIA DE HAVILLAND, BASIL RATHBONE, CLAUDE RAINS / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Roger Corman’s brutal Death Race 2000, released in 1975, is a cult favourite among fans of cars smashing into people. In 2008, the film was remade as a slick but vacuous action thriller with Jason Statham, which received two direct-to-DVD sequels of its own. And now in 2017, the king of exploitation cinema has returned to his 1975 classic and remade it himself, alongside director G. J. Echternkamp. But can this outscore the original?

The premise is basically the same – in a post-apocalyptic America, the most popular sport is the annual Death Race, in which five drivers zoom across America, earning points for killing civilians along the way, here explained as necessary due to overpopulation. The reigning champion is Frankenstein, with Arrow’s Manu Bennett filling the full-body leathers once worn by David Carradine; he’s paired up with co-driver Annie (Miller) who has secret ties to the resistance planning to end the Death Race once and for all.

You won’t be surprised to learn that, being a low-budget affair, this isn’t the slickest looking car movie you’ll have seen, but it’s nevertheless entertainingly brutal, with the racing scenes coming fast and heavy and the gore reminding us what we love about the cheap and nasty exploitation movies of the ‘70s. The cars themselves have been modernised to be more threatening and a bit less gaudy – they’re to the 1975 film’s cars what Christopher Nolan’s Batmobile was to Tim Burton’s.

Script-wise, while some of the character beats between Frankenstein and Annie, particularly in the final act, feel forced, it’s the humour that’s the real appeal. Here there’s a difference in tone between the 1975 and 2000 films – whereas the original went full-on Wacky Races, Death Race 2050 is more satirical, as ridiculous and overblown as that satire is. It’s got a broad range of targets, from radical Christianity to AI technology to reality TV. It also takes self-aware shots at the masculinity of these kinds of films, with overly muscular racer Jed Perfectus having a breakdown over his own self-image and Annie calling Frankenstein out on his “vintage macho bullshit”.

But the most striking satirical target is not any of the racers but the film’s take on America itself, now a post-apocalyptic wasteland with Baltimore having become ‘Upper Shitville’ and West Virginia now ‘Biscuit Planet, Inc’. And – be warned, this is where it may feel a little close to the bone right now – it’s led by Malcolm McDowell’s silly-haired and egotistic Chairman of the United Corporations of America.

That’s right, Death Race 2050 is the anti-Trump satire we all need. Sure, the budget shows, but what shows even more is this film’s angry, anarchistic spirit. It’s The Hunger Games meets Fury Road meets Wacky Races and it’s way more fun than it has any right to be.

Extras: Featurettes / Deleted Scenes

DEATH RACE 2050 / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: G. J. ECHTERNKAMP / SCREENPLAY: G. J. ECHTERNKAMP, MATT YAMASHITA / STARRING: MANU BENNETT, MARCI MILLER, MALCOLM MCDOWELL / RELEASE DATE: MARCH 20TH

Back in 2014, Matt Johnson and Owen Williams made their presence known by starring in (and in Johnson’s case co-writing and directing) their genre blended debut feature, the timely, intertextual and darkly comic Drama/Thriller The Dirties. So many audiences (including this writer) were intrigued to see what these individuals might turn their attention to next and where exactly do you go from school shooting story wrapped in a cinema love letter? Well, The Moon landing wrapped in a cinematic love letter, naturally.

Operation Avalanche, set in the mid ‘60s, conceives that there is a Russian mole at NASA tracking the progress of their mission into space and young CI A agents, Owen Williams and Matt Johnson (themselves), pose as documentary filmmakers at NASA to uncover this mole. However, when they discover that NASA is losing the space race, they put mad plans in place to fake the moon landing and help their agency hoodwink a nation – and the world – but soon events spiral into uneasy territories. Conspiracy theories can be attached to most things nowadays from huge disasters, to government law, to a Lady Gaga music video but one of the biggest around remains to be the alleged faking of the iconic 1969 moon landing. To this day the theory remains shrouded in debate and mystery and even various works of space-set cinema have come to acknowledge it (Interstellar). Heck, many remain convinced that filmmaker Stanley Kubrick had something to do with it! It is a theory as ingrained in our culture as the assassination of JFK and the death of Princess Diana (also both shrouded in conspiracy).

So, in making such a big piece of history – and the much discussed theories attached to it – the core of his latest film, Matt Johnson has certainly taken a giant leap from his smaller scaled debut. True Operation Avalanche does at times feel to take on a bit more than it can handle, with a wealth of technical information, some logical stretches (would the CIA so easily be led into assigning two young agents on a case) and the odd bit of dialogue feeling too modern for the ‘60s setting. This being said, the enticing concept and the enthused delivery ensure that this is never less than far reaching and exciting viewing. The on location shooting and times where this film’s making and the onscreen narrative blurred lines (there was a level of deception that went into shooting the movie), makes this one hell of a brazen project to undertake. Filmed in faithfully grainy vintage footage, with the costumes evoking the era well, Johnson has done a fantastic job in using the budget in all the right ways.

Many of the cast are credited as themselves and in turn give naturalistic performances and the clever way in which the film blends archive footage with shot footage makes the film feel very authentic, even though we know the events depicted are not reality. Like The Dirties, Johnson litters his film with cinema references (with posters and a mid-film cameo (kind of) and the whole production feels passionately constructed and thus demanding of your respect. Some may think that it comes over as a bit ego-driven at times but this reviewer saw it more as confident, clever and – in an age where most bemoan the death of found footage style capers – fresh.

Operation Avalanche is a really enjoyable watch that uses an ambitious screenplay by Johnson and Josh Boles and gets as much as it can out of the concept. Much like Christopher MacBride’s The Conspiracy, the film shows that the found footage-like approach is a perfect fit for this kind of narrative, with the final 30 minutes of Avalanche being a testament to this. One car sequence in particular is better delivered and more heart racing than some films with 10x the budget.

While the results are not always perfect, they are always tremendously entertaining and further proof that this young director is a force of cinematic enthusiasm and aspiration.

Special Features: Behind the Scenes / Deleted Scenes

OPERATION AVALANCHE / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: MATT JOHNSON / SCREENPLAY: MATT JOHNSON, JOSH BOLES / STARRING: MATT JOHNSON, OWEN WILLIAMS, JOSH BOLES / RELEASE DATE: 20TH MARCH

For the opening five minutes of Zombie Lake, we follow a young woman as she strips off, almost immediately, and hangs around the titular lake somewhere near a village, being very naked, until she decides to go for a swim, naked. The camera practically gives her a gynaecological exam as it drifts around her until we discover she’s not alone in the lake. It’s a zombie. A Nazi zombie at that. He stalks said young lady (still naked) for a little while before wrestling her below the water to her doom. If any of this makes Zombie Lake sound even remotely exciting, trust us, it’s not.

Director Jean Rollin was a man with two careers as a filmmaker. There’s the director who funded his own projects, making often remarkable dreamlike fantasy horror films that almost exist within their own niche genre. Then there’s the Rollin who needed to make money and to do so made total cack like this film. Originally it was to be directed by Jess Franco, another purveyor of films equal parts idiosyncratically, strangely brilliant along with plenty of utter rubbish too, but he left days before shooting began after arguing with producers. Rollin stepped in and did what he could with the meagre resources at his disposal.

The plot, such as it is, tells of the resurrected and vengeance seeking zombies who have come back pretty annoyed about having been murdered and dumped in the lake by the villagers some years earlier. Coming a few years after Ken Wiederhorn’s better received Shock Waves, and a short time before Franco’s own Nazi zombie borefest Oasis of the Zombies, this was around the time of plenty of Euro sleaze and Italian horror ‘homages’ hitting big on the international market. It’s cheap, shoddy programming done quickly and with only the briefest of nods to quality. The zombies here are the type whose make up falls off when they’re attacking people. Acting ranges from the whimsically disinterested to the should-be-in-better-films likes of Howard Vernon. It’s Rollin, so there’s plenty of nudity, but if you’re hoping for some gory Fulci-style zombie kills, Zombie Lake’s green paint and food colouring budget certainly didn’t stretch that far.

And yet, even when doing hack work, Rollin still managed to get in just a little of that atmosphere he was known for. In its own slapdash, laughable, bat crap way it becomes charmingly awful, too. However, it seems it could only really appeal to Rollin fans, and even then they’ll surely struggle. If you’re interested in discovering Rollin, this is not the film to start with. Charmingly awful it may be, but it’s still truly, profoundly patience-testingly awful.

ZOMBIE LAKE (1981) / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: JEAN ROLLIN / SCREENPLAY: A.L. MARIAUX / STARRING: HOWARD VERNON, PIERRE-MARIE ESCOURROU, ANOUCHKA  / RELEASE DATE: 20TH MARCH

While producing a kid’s TV programme as a tie-in to a toy line is certainly nothing new (this reviewer has fond memories of the likes of Transformers, Dino-Riders, Masters of the Universe, Visionaries and Centurions), it doesn’t mean that the resultant show needs to be entirely a cynical cash-grab. Hell, The Lego Movie itself proved that, and Nexo Knights is one of the latest of a number of fun series based on Lego themes.

 

It takes place in the realm of Knighton, a medieval kingdom running on sci-fi technology, where the vengeful court jester Jestro has stolen the Book of Monsters, a sentient and snarky tome of dark magic, and set about wreaking havoc on the countryside. Standing against him are the Nexo Knights, five recent graduates of the Knights Academy who are always on hand to foil his schemes.

 

Team leader is Clay, who rigidly adheres to the notions knights are supposed to embody, occasionally to the detriment of actually being able to uphold them; Macy is the only girl on the team but determined to not be The Girl, a goal in which she is sometimes hampered by also being the realm’s princess; and Lance is a spoiled rich kid whose narcissism and arrogance sometimes overshadows his diligence for his duties. Less well-developed but still engaging are Aaron, an extreme sports athlete who uses his shield as a hoverboard, and Axl, a big-hearted and perpetually hungry strongman.

 

The different and occasionally clashing personalities possessed by each of them prevents their interactions from becoming repetitive, while their varying weaponry gives the battle sequences endless variation. Events usually culminate with digital wizard Merlock 2.0 downloading enhancements into the knights’ weapons and armour via their shields (as long as there’s a decent wi-fi signal for the transfer). The power-up sequences are staged dramatically enough to actually give you goosebumps, and will have viewers of a certain age whispering “By the power of Grayskull.”

 

As the series progresses the knights become increasingly efficient at functioning as a team, their various talents complementing each other as they develop manoeuvres that combine their skills, giving events a feeling of development and continuity sometimes lacking in children’s TV. Some episodes incorporate common themes such as logic puzzles, personal fears and the importance of teamwork, but each is given a spin interesting enough to prevent it feeling overly familiar.

 

While not overtly comedic, the tone is light-hearted enough to allow for some humour, such as self-aware observations (“Do we have to pose heroically after every battle?”) and bad but amusing puns (a sword-shaped USB stick called Techcalibur). There are also numerous jokes that will fly over the heads of children but give adults a wry chuckle, including periodic references to Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

 

While first and foremost a series made for younger kids, Nexo Knights has plenty in it for older children and adults to enjoy, and is a solid entry in the growing library of entertaining Lego media.

 

NEXO KNIGHTS SEASON 1 / CERT: PG / DIRECTOR: DAVE OSBORNE, JERRY FORDER, STU GAMBLE, JEAN PAUL VERMEULEN / SCREENPLAY: MARK HOFFMEIER, ERNIE ALTBACKER, JOHN DEREVLANY, ANDREW ROBINSON / STARRING: GILES PANTON, ERIN MATHEWS, IAN HANLIN, ALESSANDRO JULIANI, BRIAN DRUMMOND, VINCENT TONG, MARK OLIVER / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

In a career that began in 1953, Spanish auteur Jess Franco was involved in well over 200 films. Inventive, provocative and often controversial, the director is renowned for his exploitation films that covered a multitude of genres from zombie and cannibal films to science fiction and historical drama. Franco is probably best remembered, however, for his sexploitation productions which focussed on women in prison, sadomasochism and lesbian vampires, with one of his most famous being Female Vampire (1975), and what an experience it is.

 

A thinly constructed plot centres on the vampire Countess Irina Karlstein (Romay – Franco’s long term muse and latterly, wife) who lures several men and women to their bloody deaths. Less a narrative exercise than a surreal erotic horror, Female Vampire is, in its most basic form, a repetitive compilation of graphic, “performance” sex scenes as Irina sucks – in the case of her male victims, very literally – the lifeforce from her victims at the point of climax. Often wearing little more than a cape and a large leather belt, Romay is an engaging actress, and one who shows few inhibitions in the pursuit of her art. Regular close-ups – a Franco trait – of her seventies-style hirsute lady parts, simulation with a phallic wooden bed post, and energetic solo cavorting on a gothic-styled bed demand little from the viewer’s imagination. But there is also an engaging, atmospheric grace with how Franco has constructed his film.

 

With Female Vampire, Franco created an ethereal vision; one that presents the film as detached from reality. Romay wanders from locale to locale, stalking her victims as if browsing at a boutique butchers, as a small group of eccentric academics discuss the impact of having a potential vampire in their midst. Only one man, another Franco regular, Jack Taylor seems to be on the same wavelength as Irina, but for most of the film it seems like he has stepped in from an entirely different production altogether. After spending the majority of his screen time thoughtfully staring into the distance, Taylor finally confronts Irina and while she clearly has more of a connection with him than her other victims, the end results are inevitable.

 

As a piece of cinematic history, Female Vampire is essential viewing as it demonstrates the style and focus of genre legend Jess Franco, in considerably more clarity than mere words ever could. It is an indulgent, excessively uncompromising work of art that is synonymous with a time that will never be repeated.

 

FEMALE VAMPIRE (1975) / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: JESS FRANCO / SCREENPLAY: JESS FRANCO, JOSYANE GIBERT / STARRING: LINA ROMAY, JACK TAYLOR, ALICE ARNO / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

If you’re a fan of seventies women-in-prison sexploitation dramas then Helga, She Wolf Of Stilberg (1978) from Patrice Rhomm (as Alain Garnier) may well be right up your genre alley. It, with a passion for tropes over narrative, ticks all the relevant boxes of an impassioned acolytes tick list, and does so with barely a shrug of indifference. And yet, for a film that excels in the compulsory quota of bare flesh, it is a strangely tedious affair.

 

What plot there is consists of Helga (a wonderfully overacting Longo) being placed in command of a female prison camp. Discovering that new inmate Elisabeth Vogel (Gori) is the daughter of a rebel political leader, Helga makes it her personal mission to abuse her charge as sexually, and brutally as possible.

 

If you’ve seen one version of this story, you’ve likely seen everything before. SS Hell Camp (1977) from Luigi Batzella, Women In Cell Block 7 (1973) from Rino Di Silvestro and most notably, the Ilsa series of films from Don Edmonds and Jess Franco cover the same territory with more style and exuberance. By comparison, Helga, She Wolf Of Stilberg feels somewhat familiar and ultimately sigh-inducingly flat. The largely chaste sex scenes become bland and repetitive as Rhomm goes through the full range of women-in-prison clichés from lesbian clinches to guards torturing chained up prisoners. Exactly what it says on the tin, just rather dull in its execution.

 

Much of the problem lies in the lack of any real sense of fun. While “tackling” supposedly important topics and themes (tenuously we know) other similarly staged films held on to a necessary sense of humour about what they were portraying. Helga, She Wolf Of Stilberg, seems to have forgotten to insert its lascivious tongue firmly into an expectant cheek, and as such the film becomes frustratingly flat. Credit where it’s due, the locations are impressive, and there is a period style to the cinematography. But, in truth, that isn’t why you would choose to watch and as such Rhomm has missed the point entirely.

 

As part of the sub-genre in which it exists Helga, She Wolf Of Stilberg is worth seeking out, if only to confirm why it is that you like the Isla films so much. Expect nothing new, and everything you’ve seen before, but nothing else and you won’t be too disappointed. Our advice: put Isla: She Wolf Of The SS on instead.

 

HELGA, SHE WOLF OF STILBERG (1978) / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: PATRICE RHOMM / SCREENPLAY: H.L. ROSTAINE / STARRING: MALISA LONGO, PATRIZIA GORI, RICHAD ALLAN / RELEASE DATE: 13TH MARCH

 

To coincide with the release of upcoming live action/3D animated adventure Smurfs: The Lost Village, Sony have released a compilation of eight classic episodes celebrating the little blue critters in their original splendour. Originally airing in 1981, the Hanna-Barbera Productions series would become an institution of children’s television and, to this day, the franchise is still ongoing, albeit via the big budget Hollywood treatment. However, old episodes are still shown occasionally for current generations of kids to discover Smurf Village in its original iteration for themselves, and with this latest DVD release, younger audiences and long-time fans alike can enjoy some of the original series’ finest efforts.

 

Every episode featured is some stellar Smurf fare, with highlights including “Sideshow Smurfs”, where Clumsy and Smurfette are captured by a wicked fella who wants to use them as pawns in his show. “Smurfs at Sea” on the other hand sees Papa Smurf recalling tales of his ocean voyages, while “The Scarlet Croaker” sees the gang kidnapped by disgusting creatures known as Wartmongers while searching for swamp root. With plenty of predicaments to overcome and adventures to be had, The Smurfs Amazing Adventures is bound to provide plenty of enjoyment for those seeking some fantastical escapism.

 

Whether you’re looking for a rough introductory guide to The Smurfs in their classic form or a fun trip down memory lane, this collection is well worth picking up. Even in adulthood this show holds up spectacularly well, so for those of you with kids seeking some entertainment for the whole family to watch together, this release should hit the spot quite Smurfly. That said, it’d also be wise to invest in boxsets of entire seasons, though the adventures found here are a perfect starting point to determine whether it’s worth delving further into the Smurf universe in future.

 

THE SMURFS AMAZING ADVENTURES / CERT: U / DIRECTORS: VARIOUS / SCREENPLAY: VARIOUS / STARRING: VARIOUS / RELEASE DATE: 13TH MARCH

 

An unhappy experience for director John Ford making Two Rode Together was, according to numerous reports from those involved, something he then took out on the cast and crew. Doing this western largely for the money, it apparently held little interest for Ford creatively. Perhaps coming only a few years after The Searchers (critically appreciated at the time of its release and a box office hit, only growing in reputation since) in which he explored similar themes, and with no personal stakes in the outcome, we can understand why.

Still, it’s fair to say that even Ford going through the motions frequently works better than a lot of other contemporary directors trying hard. Additionally this has James Stewart playing against type as the corrupt, cynical Marshall Guthrie McCabe and support from the likes of Richard Widmark. This new Masters of Cinema release is an opportunity to review whether cinema alchemy still happened despite having the disinterested Ford at the helm. It didn’t quite, but has enough to recommend. Guthrie is a Marshall enjoying having his feet up on the porch and skimming money from town businesses. That is until he’s roped into partnering with cavalry Lt. Jim Gary (Widmark) to lead an attempt to negotiate with the Comanches for the return of a number of kidnapped settler children.

Gary and Guthrie have different expectations for how this will go down, and different measures of success. What follows is a not entirely comfortable mix of trail movie, drama and romance with some near-slapstick clowning thrown in for good measure. The expedition Guthrie and Gary go on is wrapped up fairly quickly in a perfunctory manner. This is no bad thing, as the directions the film threatens to head off in, in particular the repatriation of children who have effectively become Comanche, are much more interesting. That Two Rode Together never really takes hold of these concepts and follows them through is a real disappointment, despite a powerful and grimly effective conclusion. If Ford truly didn’t care much for the film it shows. His direction is static and generally remains too tethered, whilst conversely the script veers off in one direction then another with scant regard for creating a cohesive whole.

It’s by no means a dud however, mainly thanks to the impeccable efforts of the cast. Widmark brings his craggy charm to the role of Gary, and he’s ably supported by Shirley Jones and Linda Cristal amongst others. The best thing about it is the peerless James Stewart who makes Guthrie a remarkable, complex creation. Two Rode Together is not a hitherto overlooked classic, nor is the turkey Ford considered it later on. It’s perfectly decent, enlivened by excellent actors.

TWO RODE TOGETHER / CERT: PG / DIRECTOR: JOHN FORD / SCREENPLAY: FRANK S. NUGENT / STARRING: JAMES STEWART, RICHARD WIDMARK, SHIRLEY JONES / RELEASE DATE: 13TH MARCH