Bad Genius 2017

Lynn, a top secondary school student living with her Lynn’s father, earns a scholarship to a prestigious school for her academic achievements. There, she befriends the good-natured but academically challenged Grace. The two quickly form a fragile pact: Lynn starts helping Grace cheat in exams after discovering that their teacher has been leaking questions during private tutoring sessions. This uneasy alliance deepens when Grace’s wealthy boyfriend, Pat, offers payment to Lynn to extend the cheating to him and his circle. At first Lynn balks, but she learns that the school has been charging her father extra fees despite her scholarship, a detail that hits close to home since he works as a teacher with a modest income. Motivated by a mix of resentment and necessity, she devises a covert system of hand signals, inspired by certain piano pieces, to transmit correct answers during tests, and soon her client base begins to grow.

The scheme, however, does not stay hidden for long. It is uncovered when another top student, Bank, unintentionally exposes the cheating. The fallout is swift and harsh: Lynn is reprimanded by her father and the school, her scholarship is suspended, and her chances to apply for an international scholarship are revoked. The burden of consequences weighs heavily on her, yet the lure of quick money and a bigger cover story keeps the temptation alive. Nevertheless, the personal cost becomes clear: Lynn’s integrity is rubbed raw as she watches her carefully built future start to crumble under pressure.

Still, the opportunity to escape the sting of consequences pulls Lynn back toward cheating, this time targeting the STIC—an international standardised test used for university admissions—an enterprise that could yield millions of baht. She agrees to work with Pat and Grace, but insists that Bank must be involved, reasoning that he would never embrace dishonesty on his own. Bank, a young man from a poorer background who stakes his future on the same university scholarship, faces his own crisis when he is attacked by thugs and misses the critical exam. Reluctantly, he agrees to join Lynn, and together they begin preparing for a high-stakes, globe-spanning final operation: they plan to fly to Australia to gain a head start on the exams, with the intention of sending answers back to Pat and Grace for distribution to their clients back home.

Tensions rise on the eve of departure when Pat reveals the truth he had ordered the attack on Bank to force his compliance. Enraged, Bank confronts Pat and walks away, leaving Lynn torn by the revelation. Bank later returns to press Lynn to finish what she started, and Lynn confronts a moment of reckoning about where her choices have led her.

In Sydney, the plan unfolds with meticulous precision at first. Lynn and Bank complete the initial sections, but anxiety gnaws at Bank, and he falters under pressure, forcing Lynn to clutch the final section from memory. She manages to bluff her way through a desperate, last-minute feint by pretending to be ill and exiting the test center, where Bank’s denial of knowledge saves her, at least for the moment. Back home, the scheme has been a resounding, if morally hollow, success. Yet Lynn, broken by the experience, rejects the payout and refuses to be part of a broader exploitation.

Months pass and Bank, having invested his share into revamping his mother’s laundry business, reaches out with a new proposal: start a wider scheme targeting national exams like the GAT/PAT. Lynn declines, choosing to walk away from illicit gains. Bank responds with a threat to expose the entire operation, a warning that jolts Lynn into action. She decides to come clean and confesses to her father, who supports her decision and helps her submit a formal confession to the STIC organization.

The story thus follows a young woman caught between ambition and conscience, tracing how her initial brilliance becomes a liability when moral lines blur. It is a journey through pressure, loyalty, and accountability, culminating in a courageous choice to own up to one’s actions and seek redemption, even when the cost is high and the path forward uncertain.