Night Bird

The year is 1968: the single bloodiest year of the Vietnam War. The Tet Offensive has landed the United States deeper in a seemingly unwinnable war at the cost of forty GIs per day. Respected journalists like Walter Cronkite are openly questioning the administration, and draft cards are going up in flames from coast to coast. While the fortunate few sing songs of protest on college campuses across the country, it is the blue-collar majority that is forced to take up the call to arms and defend the world from the dreaded "domino effect" of the global communist conspiracy. In the middle of this idealistic schism we find Joey, a young short-order cook working the graveyard shift at a twenty-four-hour greasy spoon in New Jersey. For Joey, Vietnam might as well be a million miles away. Between his ailing mother's medical bills and his perpetually broken-down car, Joey's entire universe is confined within the fogged-up windows of the Castle Diner. Each night, he listens to Old Jake, a grizzled World War I veteran, complain about the commie infiltrators who were destroying the morale of our boys at home and abroad. Each night, he humors Jake as he rants and argues with John, an antiwar radical determined to change the world. As far as Joey is concerned, their debate can continue indefinitely. He just waits patiently until the dawn, until the last squawk of the night bird guides him home to begin the day anew. That is, until the day his draft notice arrives. Suddenly, Joey is forced to decide where he stands. Should his duty to his country outweigh his obligation to his dying mother? Why should he go halfway around the world to kill Vietnamese people who have never bothered him? Why were we there in the first place? From within the stainless steel confines of an all-night diner, Night Bird captures the essence of an era that that challenged the status quo and spawned an ideological revolution.