New York audiences bored with the blah-blah-blah of summer blockbusters and curious about the new directions in film and media arts should make their way to Lincoln Center this weekend, to be part of the excitement of SCANNERS: The 2007 New York Video Festival, the always unpredictable and richly rewarding survey of new trends in the world of digital media. The series, a kind of wide-awake digital dreaming, opens this Friday and runs through Sunday, July 29th at the Walter Reade Theater, the flagship of the Film Society of Lincoln Center. SCANNERS has been organized by Kathy Brew, Chris Chang and Marian Masone, with Berta Sichel of Madrid ’s Museo Reina Sofia.

This year's edition of annual festival showcases a broad mix of styles that highlight the cutting-edge in film, video, high-definition and live performance. The series opens on Friday with visionary video artist Edin Vélez’s first feature, A CERTAIN FOOLISH CONSISTENCY, a multi-layered story of romance in the Big Apple, with Vélez in attendance. That will be followed by a one-of-a-kind live music performance featuring three musician/video duos: drummer Bobby Previte with VJ veteran Benton C; Ben Neill on his electro-acoustic “mutant trumpet” with artist Bill Jones; and thereminist Dorit Chrysler with media artist c.h.i.a.k.i. (Chiaki Watanabe) for muxology v.2., a media project that combines sound with kinetic images.

Other highlights from this year’s festival include several shorts programs, including a program titled RENEWABLE RESOURCES, which celebrates not-for-profit arts organization Renew Media’s 20 years of support of independent media artists, with a showcase of nine short videos from some of its prestigious fellows; LIVINGVOOM, featuring the work of artists partnered with Voom HD Networks to create a new aesthetic for high-definition television; and Emiko Omori and Wendy Slick’s PASSION AND POWER: THE TECHNOLOGY OF ORGASM, a controversial and often hilarious history of the vibrator, presented in state-of-the-art HD technology. A Festival must is New York Press critic Armond White’s annual incisive look at the current state of the music video. On Saturday evening, he will lead audiences into the maelstrom of music video innovation by such interpretive artists as Mark Romanek, Hype Williams, Marcus Nispel and Benjamin Stokes, featuring the stylings of such music legends as L.L. Cool J, Jay Z, R.E.M., Erasure and RuPaul.

This is truly a be-there-or-be-square event, the Film Society's contribution to the Lincoln Center Festival of live performance, theater, opera and dance that has become a mainstay of summer in the city. For more information on this and upcoming programs, visit the Film Society website at: www.filmlinc.com

Sandy Mandelberger, Film New York Editor on fest21.com