It was the first top-billed starring role for Samuel L. Jackson, who plays a Los Angeles teacher caught with gang trouble in an urban high school.

The original screenplay was written in 1995 by Scott Yagemann, a Los Angeles area high school substitute teacher for seven years.

Dennis Broadway, a gangster student to whom he had given a failing grade, threatens to murder him, writing the number 187 (the police code for homicide) on every page in a textbook.

Soon afterwards, Dennis ambushes Garfield in the school hallway, stabbing him in the back and side multiple times with a shiv.

Garfield survives and is shown resuming his teaching career as a substitute teacher fifteen months later.

He relocates to the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles, but is assigned to another class of unruly students, including a Chicano tag crew by the name of "Kappin' Off Suckers" (K.O.S.).

Their leader, Benny Chacón, a felon attending high school as a condition of probation, makes it clear to Garfield that there will be no mutual respect.

Later after spraying cartoon graffiti depicting a dead dog, César is shot with a syringe filled with morphine attached to the end of an arrow.

Garfield is eventually fired after administrators find out that he had Rita over to his house for a tutoring session due to the unsavory implications.

Driven by his sense of honor and enraged over the failure of his revenge, César insists on taking his rightful turn against the protests of his horrified friends and ends up killing himself.

Paco, the only other surviving member of the K.O.S, drops out of school yet stays behind long enough to watch the graduation before disappearing into the city.

[6] In retrospect Director Kevin Reynolds said the movie was a "great experience" and blamed the grim ending for the lukewarm reception.

In an interview with Vulture, Samuel L. Jackson singled out One Eight Seven as his most underrated film: “One Eight Seven was a serious subject that got kicked to the curb for some reason.