Intrigue

A teenage boy expelled from school for fighting arrives at a boarding school where the systematic bullying of younger students is encouraged as a means to maintain discipline, and decides to fight back.

Erik is expelled from school for fighting. He ends up at a private boarding school where the senior students control the young ones. Erik finds a friend in Pierre, his room mate. The story revolves around Erik who just wishes to be left alone and graduate. He doesn't listen to what the seniors have to say and they don't like it.—Mikael

Erik Ponti is a sixteen-year-old boy who faces a lot of violence in his life. At school, he and his gang lend money to other students at high interest, resulting in a beating if they don't pay the money back in time; several teachers maltreat students that don't behave (in the book; in the movie it is not explained so widely). At home he lives with his sadistic stepfather and his mother.

When Erik and his gang are caught stealing records from stores, Erik gets the entire blame because of the loose kind of loyalty in the gang, resulting in his expulsion from school (again, in the book; in the movie he's just shown fighting with other students). But circumstances allow him to matriculate into a private boarding school, Stjärnsberg, where he gets a new chance to continue his studies. Erik decides to try and break away from his earlier violent lifestyle.

But Stjärnsberg isn't as nice and friendly as it seems initially. Erik has to face new kinds of violence in this school; from upperclassmen and members of the school council instead of teachers. At the school, a system called "kamratuppfostran" ("schoolmate upbringing") is in place; a code name for a violent kind of bullying directed especially at nonconforming students, ostensibly to keep discipline and order in school. Erik, being the kind of person who won't accept injustices, quickly becomes the main target.

In the movie, ondskan ("the evil") may be interpreted as referring to Erik himself (bullying other students prior to his departure to Stjärnsberg), his stepfather (who beats Erik on every occasion), the indifference of the teachers at Stjärnsberg, or "kamratuppfostran", which is represented by Otto Silverhielm and Gustaf Dahlén.