There are three things, that every fall, greatly compensate for the dwindling of warm summer days: a foamy Starbucks’ pumpkin spice latte, reinstitution of the scarf as an accessory, and the Calgary International Film Festival.

This year’s festival aims ‘to draw in the untapped audience’, including those suburbanites that otherwise never come downtown to watch a film. Though the festival lost a venue with the closure of the Utptown theatre, CIFF Programming Manager Brenda Lieberman states the 2012 festival will offer just as many seatings between the Globe and Eau Claire as it did last year, the latter of which will be offering 3D screenings new to this year’s program.

GayCalgary Magazine is proud to be sponsor of the three Queer/Gay and Lesbian genre films on the festival’s slate.

"I think it’s important to represent every genre that exists," Lieberman says, "to have a broad spectrum of films from worldwide."

Whether that’s special interest, dance, music or art house, CIFF doesn’t put a limit on films per genre. They simply select films best suited to the festival regardless of their content. One rule does however apply: they need be premiers in the city, meaning any queer genre films that were shown at the Fairy Tales International Queer Festival would not be admissible to this festival.

Lieberman is especially keen on a German reel. "A darker romance called Bliss. It’s got an edge to it so it’s quite a unique film," she says.

With your warm beverage in hand get ready to embrace this year’s cardiac arresting line up – a host of films that promise to put the spice into every show time, whether that taste be bitter, acrid or sweet.  The following are those in the Queer/Gay & Lesbian category, but should that not be your particular taste, the festival hopes they have programmed a little something for everyone.

Directed by Xavier Dolan, Canada, 2012, 169 minutes, English subtitles

For those of us that spent a week in recovery after watching the gripping J’ai tué ma mere (I Killed My Mother; written, directed and starring a then very young Xavier Dolan of Montreal – he was just 19 when he wrote that script), Laurence Anyways will unquestionably be inked in our agenda.

This is Dolan’s third feature film following Les Amours Imaginaires which took the top prize of the Official Competition at the Sydney Film Festival and was privately funded.

Dolan, the 23-year-old actor/writer of Egyptian descent – and voice of Stan on the Quebec-specific French language dubbed Southpark in his downtime – is gay and describes his first film as semi-autobiographical.

Laurence Anyways focuses on a young bohemian couple whose ties become unraveled when Laurence expresses his need to be a woman. Dolan shot the film in a ‘hyper-florid style’ and selected a cast that delivers a brave, powerful performance. Suzanne Clément is riveting as the partner who strives to stand by Laurence, however different the course this puts them on may be, and must suffer with him through the consequences of embracing his transgender identity.

A trailer can be viewed at http://www.gaycalgary.com/u492. This film competed in the Un Certain Regard selection at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, where Clément deservingly took home to Quebec the selection’s Award for Best Actress. Laurence Anyways also won the Cannes’s Queer Palm Award.

Directed by Dominique Cardona & Laurie Colbert, Canada, 2012, 90 minutes

Hello, Canadian version of Mary Poppins. Margarita is not your standard nanny. She throws boozy hot tub parties, flirts with the hunky Brazilian maintenance guy, and is in love with another woman.

Mexican and dwelling illegally in Canada, Margarita’s life is thrown into arrears when the power couple employing her let her go, unaware of the mortar she enacted betwixt the complicated bricks of their lives.

Gail and Ben appear the couple who has it all together, but in reality it’s Margarita who has single-handedly been raising their daughter, Mali, and making ends meet as the yuppie couple’s finances diminish due to bad economic decisions.

Realizing their mistake the couple desperately grapple to keep Margarita in the country now that they have caused her deportation, with a phony marriage scheme.

Though comical in nature, Margarita actually tackles the serious social issues of immigration, class struggle, and the working family structure in Canada.

Margarita was winner of the Audience Award Best Feature at both the Women’s International Film Festival in France and at the Inside Out LGBT Festival in Toronto, 2012.

Directed by Katherine Fairfax Wright & Malika Zouhali-Worrall, UK, 2012, 90 minutes, English subtitles

Inspirational and heart breaking, Call Me Kuchu documents the life and consequent murder of LGBT activist David Kato. Kato dubbed himself the first openly gay man in Uganda, and fought for the rights of those in his community of Kuchus.

Kato worked with the striking belief that "if we keep hiding, they will say we’re not here".  At current, Uganda’s parliament has an Anti-Homosexuality Bill pending. This film could not speak to a more pressing concern.

The film follows Kato and three other activists, capturing the courageous work they conduct daily in an effort to combat the persistent media slander and public persecution the Ugandan LGBT community endure.

A trailer of the film can be viewed at http://www.gaycalgary.com/u499. Call me Kuchu took home the Best International Feature award at Hot Docs in Toronto and the Best Documentary Award in Berlin.