Director Pjotr Sapegin took the top cash prize at last month’s Worldwide Short Film Festival – scoring over $9,000 and the best Canadian short award for his animated Through My Thick Glasses. The 13-minute story, about a young girl and her grandfather’s experience in World War Two, is a coproduction between the National Film Board and Norway.

The fest ended its six-day run with an awards picnic at the Canadian Film Centre on June 19.

Jeffrey St. Jules was named best emerging Canadian filmmaker for his pioneer tale The Sadness of Johnson Joe Jangles, while this year’s audience choice award and $5,000 went to the AIDS drama Invulnerable, by Spanish director Alvaro Pastor.

Naoko Kumagai also walked away happy, having scored the Screenplay Giveaway Award and a package worth some $90,000 for her script The Contest, about a young Japanese woman trying to meet Guy Lafleur in 1975. It is Kumagai’s first shot at a screenplay, but she’s no stranger to movies – by day she is a publicist for the Toronto International Film Festival. The prize package will go toward producing The Contest.

Other winners at the fest were Germany’s Heiko Hahn, who took best live-action short for Before I Go, and Australian shorts-maker Anthony Lucas, who went home with $5,000 and best animated bragging rights for the steampunk horror The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello. As a condition of the wins, both films will be eligible for the 2006 Oscars.

Rob Stefaniuk was also presented with the Don Haig Award for emerging filmmakers for his oddball feature Phil the Alien.

-www.worldwideshortfilmfest.com