Is there a precedent for the way the Lincoln Letter was used in The Hateful Eight?
"Ole Mary Todd's calling, so I guess it must be time for bed."
This was such a great device, I'm wondering if it was purely a Tarantino invention or if he grabbed the idea from a previous book or film.
What I mean specifically is the use of a fake letter from a famous personage to gain some general advantage or specific benefit, but not simply as a plot device. (i.e. the story of the letter is actually a major element of Marquis Warren's character and identity.)
An ideal answer would be the specific source Tarantino was drawing from, assuming he did indeed lift this.
Best Answer
As Tarantino answered to a Yahoo Movies question:
"I don’t really know exactly where it came from. It just grew from the back and forth between the characters"
So it gives the impression that was his original idea.
He continues on answering about the letter:
"When this black man shows white people who respect the North a Lincoln letter, all of a sudden they look at him differently. All of a sudden they’re dealing with him in a different way. They have a different attitude to him about him: ‘Have a seat, sit down.’ It’s a whole different thing."
So the Lincoln Letter was an artifice he created and used to explain why Southern whites would even talk to a black man right after the civil war.
You can read his whole answer on the Yahoo Movies page
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Was the letter from Abraham Lincoln Real in The Hateful Eight?
The original draft of The Hateful Eight, the one that leaked online before production, didn't include the Lincoln Letter reveal. The Lincoln Letter was real in that version. But in the years since that leak, in the years that Tarantino worked on the script and the movie, the situation in the US changed around him.What is the significance of the Lincoln letter hateful eight?
The Lincoln letter both reveals the extent of the racist undercurrents in the film and in the aftermath of the Civil War and discredits Warren. Yet the deception was so skillful that Mannix cannot help but respect Warren's forgery.Is The Hateful Eight based on a true story?
And regardless of its historic setting, The Hateful Eight isn't a true story, but an original one. The Hateful Eight follows a group of travelers including a bounty hunter (Kurt Russell) and his prize (Jennifer Jason Leigh) into a stagecoach lodge called Minnie's Haberdashery to wait out a blizzard.Was The Hateful Eight filmed in a blizzard?
Filming primarily took place in the mountains of Colorado during the wintertime. However, for the scenes depicting the whiteout blizzard, the production crew kept running into good weather. In order to simulate a blizzard, the crew employed large fans, starch, and sun-blocking visors.Hateful Eight - Funniest Scene (Lincoln Letter)
More answers regarding is there a precedent for the way the Lincoln Letter was used in The Hateful Eight?
Answer 2
The letter shows that Marquis actually knew nothing about Lincoln except that he was president. As history tells us Mary Todd had some serious mental issues and in reality, Abe was at his wits-end with dealing with her. It was not a good relationship. So, Abe probably would not have included the "Ole Mary Todd is waiting" line. Clearly this is a forgery. Also, the letter says nothing. It’s just a bunch of platitudes, which makes it particularly funny when you think about Marquis composing it and then his watching the tearful John Ruth read it. Finally, the letter is used at two of the funniest/darkest parts of the movie. The first time, where John Ruth reads it, and it ends "with a punch line". Marquis punches Daisy in the mouth. Then the final scene, with the two former, ”natural-enemies", covered in blood and gore, nuts shot off, and dying together in the bed. Patriotic music plays in the background and the camera slowly pans up behind a severed arm dangling from a hung dead woman. "That's a nice touch" is the punch line for this scene and for the dark humor running through the entire movie. Once you get the joke, "that's a nice touch" gets funnier with every viewing.
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