The film is about a young couple who meet in 1948 America, fall in love and get married. They have dreams of what they want to become in their careers and as Frank surpasses his, April misses out on becoming an actress. Their marriage becomes strained as Frank moves up the corporate ladder and eventually has an affair with a woman in his office. Eventually the pair begin to talk about moving to Paris. This is a way for them to restore the wonder in their lives that has been lost for some time. But as they get more and more energized by the reality of moving Frank gets a promotion and April becomes pregnant, and Frank descends back to the security of his job with a new child on the way. Taken together, such a group of decisions crushes April's hope.
The irony is that John, the son of the Giver family, is the only one who sees this as insane. (John has been away at an insane asylum and has been released.) The point of this scenario is that what is the logical thing to do for most people is actually the thing that destroys the life that they were meant to live with one another. From this point, everything falls apart. April stops caring about Frank. The opposite of love is not hate, it's apathy. When she stops concerning herself with Frank it devalues him and this leads her further into depression and eventually to attempt a self-abortion. This leads to her death, and a new family moves into the Wheelers lovely home. And the street becomes a place of great loss, almost a gravestone to the Wheeler's lives and a monument to lives unfulfilled.
