The year is 1968 and revolution is in the air.

Thousands of young people around the world are challenging every aspect of society from the war in Vietnam, to attitudes about sex, drugs and rock and roll.

 Mark Simon, a leader of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), in an upstate New York college is trying to make the revolution a reality while having to choose between the girl he loves and his political beliefs.

  Mark and his fellow radicals are leading hundreds of students in an escalating series of confrontations with the college administration. When they are not taking over buildings, talking politics, or throwing a cream pie in the college president's face, they are listening to music, smoking dope and exploring their sexuality. 

But there is a rift in SDS, as one faction plans to go underground and blow up a campus facility contributing to the war in Vietnam.

The personal collides with the political as one student considers suicide at the prospect of coming out about his homosexuality. Another student, the elder statesman of SDS, has to make a choice between his personal integrity and taking care of his growing family. Mark, the protagonist, has to betray his girlfriend to stay true to his politics. All the while there is an undercover cop who has infiltrated SDS.