Blanche wants Mitch to save her and help her change her current situation. There is a great reason for her to want this, she has lost it all:
the family home of Belle Reve
her husband, to suicide
her sister, to Kowalski
both her parents, told old age and disease
her reputation
her job
her money
her friends
any prospects for a job
her stability, in every way and form
It comes to no surprise that Blanche would beg for someone, anyone, to help her get out of the massive rut that she is stuck in. Mitch is easy to manipulate and seems to be as needy as Blanche. He is ideal for her, because he is likely to do anything she asks him to do. He would have done it, too, had it not been due to Stanley Kowalski's meddling to separate the potential couple.
Mitch was, therefore, Blanche's last card to play before everything was really over for her.
Blanche explicitly says that she does indeed want Mitch. With his courtliness, immaculate dress sense, and his old-fashioned Southern manners, he's a breath of fresh air. Certainly, he's a welcome change from most of the men she comes across, the "apes" as she calls them—particularly Stanley:
“I want to rest! I want to breathe quietly again! Yes—I want Mitch…very badly!”
Blanche desperately needs to be loved, needs to be protected from a harsh, unforgiving world which has treated her so badly. And Mitch appears just the man for the job. Blanche also comes to look upon Mitch as some kind of savior figure, someone who can save her from a disreputable past. But this is pure fantasy on Blanche's part.
In fact, Mitch's desire for Blanche is also a fantasy. He perceives her to be a fine, upstanding, respectable Southern belle. However, when he finds out the true nature of her sordid past, the scales fall from his eyes immediately. She's not the woman he thought she was; she's the complete antithesis of the ideal fantasy figure he's constructed to fill a gaping emotional void. And when Mitch finds out about the real Blanche, she gets to see the real Mitch—a violent, would-be rapist who's just like every man she's ever met.
Ultimately, they both realize that it's not what they want, but what society will allow, that really matters in such a time and such a place.
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