I Want to Live

Depending on which way you look at it, this dramatic '58 film is either a stinging condemnation of capital punishment or hysterical propaganda - but more curious minds might want to put aside whether Barbara Graham (Susan Hayward) was guilty of the murder of Mabel Monohan, and focus on the way the justice system functioned in this instance. Murderers are encouraged to be the first to confess and pin the blame on co-conspirators - thus attaining for themselves immunity. Fellow inmates entrap the accused and undercover cops encourage or demand they confess in return for false alibis. For that prison sentences are reduced to 'time served'. Criminals are promised favours for their testimony. If the suspect in the hot seat is actually guilty, it often feels there's justification for no-holds-barred battle when it comes to law and order - but when that suspect is actually innocent, these battle tactics will produce guilty verdicts regardless, and as such are obviously not serving the interests of justice. From what I read, Barbara Graham was probably involved with the murder, and thus could be prosecuted for murder, but at the same time the way she was found guilty really stinks - and the fact that she was sentenced to death rubs one the wrong way. Life imprisonment when there's a shred of doubt concerning her involvement seems a more decent way to have handled this case.

So what kind of Barbara Graham does Susan Hayward give us with her Oscar-winning portrayal - one that swept aside the likes of Elizabeth Taylor for her star turn in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof? She brings forth a Barbara who is defiant and one who lusts for life - and also a Barbara who is perhaps a little unrealistically principled - trying to live a straight life after her first stint in prison, but being let down by husband Hank (Wesley Lau) and his drug addiction. We don't dwell too much on the fact that the real Barbara Graham was a prostitute - first working naval bases before graduating to a high class brothel in San Francisco. This was 1958 (at one famous moment late in the film, she's denied Barbara's famous last words "How the hell would you know?" when executioners try to advise her on the most painless way to take in the poisonous gas - instead she's restricted to "How do you know?") and as such Barbara's life is cleaned up a little so as to be suitable enough for audiences to see. The parties she attends seem remarkably clean by today's standards - even the reefers have an element of plausible deniability to them, for they might just be cigarettes. Nobody swears, does anything lude or gets into any trouble. You'd be fine with your 14-year-old attending, except he'd complain about the jazz being "so old fashioned". This all feeds into how it feels Barbara is unfairly persecuted - it only seems even more so now.

In this Robert Wise, Gidding & Mankiewicz version of the story, it's the cops who prey on Barbara. They try to entrap her in bars by tempting her. They follow her and track her. They nab her for perjury when she tries to help a friend. The jail staff poke, probe and humiliate her - they take away her humanity and rip apart what has sentimental value to her. The press make a mockery of her and her story - and turn her misfortune into a sideshow attraction. Because we never really see Barbara in a bad light, it all seems like a tragic miscarriage of justice. Her moments of defiance are tinged with righteous anger because she only demands what every person deserves - her dignity and her human rights. Her involvement with criminals always seem somewhat incidental and harmless. She delivers things. She tells a few lies. She hangs out in dens with the men who offscreen pull off the real crimes and hurt people. She shouldn't be doing it, but having a murder pinned on her and being sentenced to death? Is it because she's outspoken? Is it because she's desperate? The world never gave her and her kids a fair chance, and now they're punishing her after setting her up to fail. This is definitely Barbara Graham's side of the story.

At the corners of the screenplay, fighting to be heard, are the good guys. Psychiatrist Carl G. G. Palmberg (Theodore Bikel) sees her as a rebel with some questionable values, but contends that she's completely non-violent and innocent. He tries to convince her lawyers to fight for her obvious guiltlessness. Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Edward S. "Ed" Montgomery (Simon Oakland) is the only one who manages to break through and fight his way to a place in the middle of the movie, writing Barbara's story and sharing correspondence with her. Obviously he comes to understand the injustice that dogs his pen-friend, but is powerless to do any more but make a few bucks from her tragic destiny. As luck would have it, injustice is just as good an angle as any other when it comes to selling papers. When horns start honking in what must be a celebratory gesture at Barbara's execution, he manages to blot the ugliness of it out be silencing his hearing aide. He's heard enough. To be fair, I'm against the death penalty in all but the most extreme of cases - and Barbara's does fall well short of that no matter her culpability.

What the film does do resoundingly well is give us all a clear picture of just how ugly and horrific the whole execution process is. You could hardly fashion a more terrifying method of doing away with someone than the gas chamber. You'd think humanity would be well aware of that by now! San Quentin's gas chamber is faithfully reproduced in a studio - you can look up the real one to see just how exactly it's copied. For once those making movies needed to do no exaggerating - it's scary enough, and Lionel Lindon's camera angles and careful framing turn it into an object of claustrophobic horror. We carefully watch the preparation of sulfuric acid and other elements which will combine to produce a deadly cyanide mixture and do anything but immediately render poor Barbara deceased. This final stretch is what makes even today's audience walk away from the film a little less steady than they were a few hours earlier, as you can't but imagine what your internal response would be if forced to endure this unendurable fate. Barbara steps forth with great dignity, pride and defiance and it's those carrying out the procedure that have guilt written all over their faces. Surely this should be the other way around? Spare a moment to think of how you'd fare as executioner.

I think I Want to Live! is a great anti-death penalty film - it's only fault perhaps lionizing somebody who those in the know tell us most probably was involved with the murder of a defenseless old lady just because she/they thought she had a large amount of money stashed away in her house. It does keep a few of the more suspect elements of the American criminal justice system in our minds though. All of the wheeling and dealing that often ends up gifting the odd murderer/criminal the benefits of getting in early and ratting on their partners in crime. All of the arm-twisting and entrapment which do absolutely nothing to uncover the truth, but simply close cases and get judges to bang that gavel in quick order. At the center of it all is Susan Hayward and the sassy character we all immediately identify with simply because she demands a minimum of respect and won't be defeated by a heartless, relentless system. She gave this performance all the zest and living presence the title "I Want to Live!" absolutely demands. She's not really Barbara Graham - she's simply every American who has become an unwitting victim of a system that punishes the qualities Hayward's version of her has in spades.