Saoirse Ronan takes a big bite out of “Bad Apples”, a twisted concoction unlike anything the 32-year-old actress has done before. Directed by Jonatan Etzler, this black comedy-thriller takes several wild and unexpected turns towards full-blown satire in its warped examination of the education system, troubled children, and society’s complicity. It’s a movie that shows its audacity as it dips further into absurdity.

“Bad Apples” tells a gleefully unhinged story that never gets hung up on such things as verisimilitude or plausibility. Instead, screenwriter Jess O’Kane takes author Rasmus Lindgren’s 2020 novel “De Oönskade”, changes its location, and nearly gives it a full tonal makeover. The results are admittedly unnerving, yet darkly funny and wickedly entertaining.

Ronan brings a frantic comic energy to the role of Maria Spencer, an elementary teacher at a primary school in Somerset, England. Maria loves teaching, but this year has been difficult thanks to a problem child named Danny (Eddie Waller). The disobedient and defiant 10-year-old routinely disrupts field trips, turns the classroom into chaos, and bullies his classmates. His negligent father doesn’t know what to do with him, and the school principal refuses to face the issue, despite Maria’s calls for help. Instead he gives her one more chance to get Danny under control on her own.

But after Danny violently pushes a sycophantic classmate named Pauline (Nia Brown) down a flight of stairs, it’s enough to get him suspended. With Danny away, things almost instantly change in Maria’s classroom as both she and her students flourish. But late one evening Maria encounters Danny vandalizing her car. She intervenes only to inadvertently knock the boy unconscious. Maria rushes him to the hospital, but on the way Danny wakes up and threatens to tell everyone she attacked him.

Panicking, Maria takes a detour back to her house. And after an aggressive Danny begins destroying her home, Maria forces him into her basement and locks the door. The next morning, Maria goes to school as normal and has a great day, even scoring high marks during her classroom evaluation. A conflicted Maria now faces a dilemma. Does she let Danny go and attempt to explain the whole wacky misunderstanding? Or does she keep Danny captive so that she and her class can continue to succeed? To no surprise she chooses the latter.

I won’t spoil the lengths to which Maria goes to keep her bonkers secret. But as you can probably guess, a secret like that isn’t easy to keep. Adding an even wilder spin, Maria never loses her teacher mentality which both waters and poisons her relationship with Danny. Ronan’s stellar balance of ambivalence and subdued charm leaves us both sympathetic and appalled by Maria’s actions. Newcomer Waller is terrific playing a diabolical terror while still maintaining a human pulse.

While “Bad Apples” has its fun playing around within genre and satire, its razor-sharp statements on broken educational systems carry surprising weight. From the opening shots featuring hundreds of apples on a cider mill conveyor to the sobering final shot that painfully brings everything to light, Etzler keeps his central themes in sight. And no matter how absurd the situations get, he and O’Kane give us plenty to wrestle with.