Jeffrey St. Jules has won the 2015 Claude Jutra Award for his first feature Bang Bang Baby, the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television announced Thursday.

The prize, sponsored by Telefilm Canada, honours the outstanding debut of a first-time filmmaker. St. Jules served as writer/director on Bang Bang Baby, which had its world premiere at TIFF and was produced by Scythia Films. Search Engine Films picked up the Canadian rights to Bang Bang Baby in December, and will also be distributing the film in Greece, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Israel, Malaysia, Philippines, Portugal, Singapore, South Africa, Turkey and Vietnam.

St. Jules’ projects prior to Bang Bang Baby include the shorts The Sadness of Johnson Joe Jangles, which won him the prize of best emerging filmmaker at the Worldwide Short Film Fest, and The Tragic Story of Nling, which screened at Sundance. He also directed and wrote the 2012 NFB documentary Let The Daylight Into The Swamp.

Bang Bang Baby also received two other Canadian Screen Award nominations for 2015, including best performance by an actor in a supporting role for Justin Chatwin and achievement in overall sound for Christopher Guglick, Dave Merkel, Steve Moore, Justin Sawyer and Alex Turner.

St. Jules will be presented with the Claude Jutra award during the Canadian Screen Awards broadcast gala on March 1.