Plot
Teenage outcast and football player Johnny Rourke falls for upper-class cheerleader Tracey Prescott. She is officially dating his teammate Randy Daniels. A random draw at the high school 'Tin Can-Can' dance pairs Johnny and Tracey.
Worlds collide and opposites attract as they connect on the dance floor. Jealous Randy picks a fight with Johnny, the coach Phil Barton intervenes, and Johnny leaves in a huff. Tracey follows, and he offers to take her out on his motorbike. He shows her his lookout spot, and they talk about their future plans.
The next day at school Johnny gets a call from the mill, as his dad John Sr. is too drunk to work. It causes him to be late to practice, so Coach Barton berates him. When he does not divulge why, he is kicked off the team. Arriving home in a belligerent mood, he argues with John Sr., who smashes his stereo and throws him out.
At home, Tracey talks to her mom, lamenting that she is considered to be the perfect daughter. She tears out of her driveway and down the road. Johnny detects her inquietude, follows closely, then he gets her to stop. They sneak into the high school. Reading his file identifying him as anti-social and potentially dangerous since his mother's abandonment, Johnny and Tracey go on a rampage. They strew file contents throughout the halls, freeing the animals and creatures in the biology classroom, smash trophy cases, strip and jump into the pool, where he kisses her, and they later sleep together.
Johnny wakes up alone, so he seeks Tracey out at her house, as she is meant to be alone for the weekend. He pushes his way in, and although she weakly resists at first, she caves in. They are woken up in her parents' room by her younger brother Davey, who explains her family came back early. He helps sneak Johnny out.
At the pep rally that night, Johnny asks to speak to Tracey. She arrives very late to his look out. He reiterates how he needs to leave, unintentionally scaring her. For a few days she avoids him at school. He gets called into the factory again, but this time to clear out John Sr.'s locker after his death.
After the funeral, which Tracey attends from afar, Johnny tries to go through John Sr.'s things. Finding keepsakes of his mother who abandoned them, he sets fire to them and the whole place. Hopes dashed, future prospects dim and the omnipresent steel mill looming large in the background of this one-industry town, Johnny comes to grips with his estranged mother and recently deceased father. Johnny turns up to the career fair, wanting to speak alone with Tracey. She is forced to decide between her stable longtime boyfriend Randy and Johnny. Johnny declares his love for her, and they drive off together on his motorcycle to Davey's cheers.
