Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) is an outsider at school. She is unpopular among her classmates, brought up by a fanatically religious mother, she is for the most part a loner. After an embarrassing incident in the school showers, her classmates ridicule her even more than before, however this does not go unnoticed by the gym teacher who punishes them. While one of them takes pity on her, others plan to get revenge... But all does not go to plan.