La Permission

La Permission is a French-language novel written by Melvin Van Peebles.

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In the late 1950s, Van Peebles had dabbled with filmmaking a little, and had made two short films. He was unable to establish himself as a director in Hollywood, because the concept of a black director was then-unheard of to Americans. So, he went to France, learned the language, and wrote the novel in French.

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Learning he could adapt one of his novels into film with a $60,000 grant from the French Cinema Center, so long as his film was ?artistically valuable, but not necessarily commercially viable,? he sought a producer. Once partnered with the Office de Production d'Edition et de Realisation (OPERA), a collective consisting of Michel Zemer, Guy Pefond and Christian Shivat, he shot La Permission in 36 days for a cost of $200,000, finally releasing the picture under the title The Story of a Three-Day Pass (1967).

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It tells the story of Turner (Harry Baird), a Black army man who meets a White Parisian named Miriam (Nicole Berger). The pair spends a weekend together, enjoying their romance but also struggling with the complexities of racism. Eventually their miscegenation is reported to Turner's Captain (Hal Brav) and he's restricted to barracks where he realizes the futility of such amorous adventures.

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