Little Pratheesh has been seeing a classmate, Ashalatha, for years but cannot confess his affection due to his shyness. One day he hears news that she was raped and murdered. He breaks down from shock and is unable to sleep alone in the darkness. He drops out of school to stay at home. With help from his elder brother, he manages to get a job at a textile shop where he finds a mannequin and believes it is Ashalatha resurrected. He now has to be brave enough to protect her from this dangerous world. In Arabic, “Zahir” means ‘obvious’ or ‘conspicuous’, and the director seems inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’ same titled short story. Mass media like television idealizes love between a man and a woman, but the reality is that communication between the sexes should be cautious, if not forbidden. It is based on a society that internalizes direct and indirect violence against women. Pratheesh might be happiest when he falls in the Zahir, the mannequin losing his sense of reality. (PARK Sungho)