It begins with loud rock music playing as a quote from a David Bowie song is on a black background. It shatters like glass to show the high school that they are spending their detention in while the brain, Brian, is talking in the background, the movie ends like this also. While he says different things there are parts of the school that are cut to. An example would be when he is talking about a criminal they show a locker that says, "Open this locker and you will die fag!!!" written in black marker on it. The rest of the story takes place in the school library and what the five students do while their principle isn't looking. At one point they smoke marijuana and the boy that is a jock breaks a glass door. They also put music on and dance around all over the library.
One of the main characters John Bender, who they call Bender, is the criminal. He lights his shoe on fire to light a cigarette, he pulls apart books, and he steals the screw from the door that is suppose to be open so it closes and the principal can't watch them. He ends up getting two months more of detention for telling of the principal by talking back to the principal. While that section of the movie is going on the camera angle makes the principal look