Grim, almost unbearably intense, I Want To Live is the story of the life and execution of Barbara Graham (Susan Hayward) a perjurer, prostitute, liar and drug addict. The product of a broken home, Graham works as a shill, luring gullible men into crooked card games. She attempts to go straight, marries the wrong man, and has a baby. When her life falls apart, she returns to her former profession and is involved in a murder. Despite her claims of innocence, she is convicted and executed. Robert
Wise directs the uniformly fine cast with grim efficiency, telling Graham's story in a series of adroitly crafted scenes that won him a well-deserved Academy Award nomination. However, the film belongs to Susan Hayward who gives a intense, shattering performance without one false note. Her performance is so grimly focused that she is, at times, almost unbearable to watch. The final scenes, which lead up to Graham's execution, are exhausting in their emotional intensity as the audience is spared nothing of Graham's agony, despair and desperation when she finally loses the long battle to save her life. Whether one sees Graham as a murderer or a hapless victim of society, the power and relentless, sordid reality of her story leaves an indelible memory in the mind of the viewer. ~ Linda Rasmussen, Rovi
Susan Hayward won the 1958 Oscar for her most famous role, as real-life Barbara Graham who was excuted in a gas chamber, in Robert Wise's gritty noir melodrama, one of Hollywood's first detailed accounts of capital punishment.
Director Wise is content to let Hayward take the film in her teeth from the moment she appears in the film and not let it go until she collapses in the gas chamber two hours later.
What of course makes the idea of this film intriguing is that this is a woman heading for a Death Sentance in a time where that would be dominated by Men. Based on the true story of party girl Barbara Graham this film shows a woman high on the excitement of the wrong side of the law and being charged for a murder she
may or may not have committed.
The story is rather drawn out and despite our main character being quite Bold and brassy for the era, the film isn?t particularly exciting viewing, from a true crime prespective it is an interesting story and would perhaps warrant a remake in more graphic detail.
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