In the space of 15 minutes, James Allen takes us through an array of comedy, suspense and drama in his directorial debut, "Judge is God." He says the idea came to him in a dream. "It was a very intense dream, in which I saw three very distinct images: a couple breaking into a house, a judge who gets kidnapped, and the judge slobbering all over himself. The three images were so distinct and memorable, I wrote them down in a memo once I woke up. And then I put the memo away, stuffed it in a drawer somewhere and nearly forgot about it. One day I came across it again, showed it to Minae (Minae Noji, producer and star of the film) and instantly, she said, 'I think that would make a really good film.' It all sounds very simple, but I guess I now feel it was fortunate to have that dream.' James and Minae met on the set of another film production, where James was the assistant director and Minae was acting, and says her vast acting experience came in handy when they set out to make "Judge is God." "She was extremely helpful on this film in terms of casting. When it came time to find actors and audition them for the role of the judge, we struggled to find the right actor for the part, because he had to be in or around his sixties and had the 'look' of a judge. Minae, who is incredibly resourceful, asked her acting coach to consider the part. She gave him a copy of the script and finally, we had our man." The Short Shorts Film Festival marks the international debut of "Judge is God." "I was unsure of how this film would be received at a foreign film festival. I deliberately put all sorts of aspects into this film, funny, serious, light, dark. I put everything I wanted into this film. So, even if I failed somehow, that was okay, because I took a sort of experimental approach to its creation." "I think it's hard to follow a film when you have to read subtitles, but I think that so far, the reaction to my film has been pretty good. This film isn't 100% comedy so, I wasn't expecting people to laugh from the start. However, there are definitely parts in the film where people laugh, and they're supposed to. For example, the scene in which the heroine bashes her head against the judge's head…Overall, I think the response has been really good, and I'm quite pleased." "Judge is God," is listed in the SSFF program as an American film, even though James is originally from England, Minae is Japanese-American and the cast and crew involved in the making of the film was a mixture of people from all over the world. "The film is more or less an American and English production. This is a story that could happen in either country." And speaking of national and differences, James finds that sometimes cultures like his own are similar to others he least expects to resemble. "About three years ago, I met a Japanese person and as I got to know them, I became increasingly aware of the similarities between us. We both come from island nations, from countries with deep cultural traditions and customs that (non-English or non-Japanese) don't always understand. And because of those similarities, I think, there are naturally similarities in character. It's all very interesting, I think." James is currently hard at work on a feature-length project, which he says will have a lightning-fast temp much like the film "Run, Lola, Run," and centers around a man who plans to go to the opera, but doesn't get in and instead finds himself in a story that spins him outside the opera and the opera house…

Minae, producer, star and singer - that's her singing the ending credits of "Judge is God" - is a Japanese-American who was born in Hollywood and raised in Los Angeles. Minae first learned to dance at the age of three, and eventually studied singing and acting as she got older. "I had been acting for a while, so I decided that I would start producing. One of the main reasons I decided to produce was because I felt that I was seeing nothing but stereotypes of Asians in so many of the films I watched. Either they didn't speak any English, or they played housewives - they were always in these roles that weren't powerful or important. I wanted to produce films in which those preconceived notions of Asians don't exist." One of the major roles a producer plays in making a film is raising the necessary funds for production. "Of course, I put in some of my own money. Then I passed the script out to as many people as possible, and we got money from people who really liked it. I also reached out to the Japanese community in Los Angeles and got a lot of support. I decided, also, that if this film did well, then the next film I produce, hopefully, would be a feature-length film that would also make money, and then I could give back to everyone who so generously supported us. I'd like to think there's a lot of goodwill out there." In addition to finding more meaningful roles for Asian actors on screen, Minae also made it a point to have a crew behind the camera that was culturally diverse. The director, James Allen, is originally from England, and the rest of the crew included people from France, Canada and China, to name a few. "It's natural for your own culture to come out in the films you make. But I think the most important part of a film is what the audiences think of it. From a reverse perspective, if you put all sorts of people into a film, and the images of them are stereotypical, then that's the impression you're going to leave on your audiences. Latin people are like this, Asians are all like this, and so on. I wanted to at least try to get rid of those kinds of notions that people have of other people by having a diverse group in front of the camera and behind it. For me, that was one of the most important points in making this film."