Bad Apples

Bad Apples is a British dark comedy and suspense film directed by Jonatan Etzler and written by Jess O’Kane. Saoirse Ronan stars as Maria, a primary-school teacher struggling to motivate a class of 11-year-olds. One pupil’s behavior gets worse as Maria’s career comes under scrutiny. A series of bad choices ends with the child accidentally locked inside her home; once her classroom improves without him, she faces an awful decision about what to do next. The story is a satire about the temptation to treat a person as the problem rather than face one’s own actions.

Jacob Anderson, Eddie Waller, Nia Brown, Rakie Ayola, Robert Emms and Sean Gilder are also in the cast. Pulse Films produced the movie, with Oskar Pimlott named as producer. Nea Asphäll shot it, Robert Krantz edited it and Chris Roe composed the music. San Sebastián listed a 99-minute runtime and programmed it as the opening film in its 2025 New Directors section. Republic Pictures distributes it in the U.S., where limited theatrical release begins September 18, 2026. The year in this page’s URL reflects the film’s festival year, not its U.S. release date.