Simon, Bruce Davison is a student at a fictional San Francisco university who begins as a bystander to the rising campus protests. He learns of plans to occupy a university building in response to a gym’s construction, a move framed as standing up for the local minority community. His curiosity pulls him toward the demonstrations, and on the way he notices Linda, Kim Darby, falling for her at first sight. He follows her into the protest, and together they throw themselves into the action. When the strikers grow hungry, the couple even participate in a local grocer raid, a small act of audacious rebellion amid the chaos of the moment.
As their romance evolves, Simon admits a lingering detachment about lifelong commitment, explaining the hard work it took to gain his place in college. Linda counters that she cannot date someone who isn’t equally devoted to the movement, and the two part ways for now. The situation tightens when a right-wing athlete named George, Murray MacLeod, assaults Simon; the altercation becomes a pretext to claim police brutality and earns Simon a place in the campus spotlight. He is then unexpectedly drawn into a moment of vulnerability when a younger protester seduces him, revealing how personal and political lines blur within the movement.
Linda eventually returns and commits to staying with Simon. They spend an afternoon in the park, where a group of African American protesters confronts them, and one member destroys Simon’s camera, sparking a deeper crisis of trust and purpose. The tension comes to a head as Simon challenges the protesters, arguing that those they seek to help can appear no different from the violent cops they oppose. Yet his perspective begins to shift after a hospital visit to George; witnessing the consequences of political violence firsthand forces him to reconsider his stance.
Leaving the hospital, Simon presses the dean’s office to halt the gym project or risk further violence, a moment that foreshadows the eruption to come. The campus erupts as city police and the National Guard, armed with bayoneted rifles, move in to crush the takeover. Demonstrators are dragged out, struck with batons, and overwhelmed by tear gas. Linda is carried away, resisting, while Simon makes a bold, solitary charge against a line of officers. In the film’s closing images, fleeting memories of Simon’s happier college days flash before the viewer, underscoring the journey from passive observer to a man transformed by protest, discipline, and disillusion.
