If... [Criterion Collection]

The students of an all-male military school for adolescent and teen boys is the sight of a rebellion. A triumvirate of rebels are disciplined and the leader is severely flogged. The students decide they can take no more and launch tear gas into the auditorium during a speech by a pompous school official. When the adults exit the building, the students are ready and armed with rifles. The cruel headmaster discovers the hard way that they are not firing blanks when he is it hit between the eyes with a bullet. A nude woman wanders around the courtyard in hysterics after the incident. It is not revealed why she is undressed, only that she is the wife of the housemaster. While fighting against the rigid system of rules imposed by the school, the rebels develop their own hierarchy and justice as the older boys lead the way in the revolt that captures the institution and its adult leaders off guard.