The first utterances you hear in Woody Allen's latest picture, Blue Jasmine, come from a manic First Class passenger who blabs on and on about herself. That passenger is title  character Jasmine, whose marriage to Madoff avatar Hal (Alec Baldwin) is now as finished as her 1% coffers, and who's going nowhere fast. She's also played by Cate Blanchett, which helps explain why we not only put up with her snobbish affectations, we can't g...

  by Quendrith Johnson, Los Angeles Correspondent   When the mantle is passed, Hollywood usually makes a show of it. Consider Julia Roberts' crown going to Anne Hathaway, or Katharine Hepburn grudgingly making way for Meryl Streep. With Woody Allen's late career opus, Blue Jasmine, the mantle has just passed from Meryl Streep to Cate Blanchett, and she is phenomenal.  There are subtleties Blanchett taps into here that evoke a little bit of Vivien Leigh, Susan Hayward...