Director Adam Cornelius’ Ecstasy of Order: The Tetris Masters is a documentary about the world’s best Tetris players, equally dedicated to their game in the way that Billy Mitchell and Steve Wiebe were in Kong. The film explores the intense and obsessive relationship between players and the classic brick-stacking puzzler, and the return of Tetris master Thor Aackerlund, who trounced the game back at the 1990 Nintendo World Championship. Here’s a trailer for the film – it’s worth a watch.

The film has been making the rounds at various fests, and looks pretty great from the trailer. There’s no word on a wider theatrical or digital release date, but the film’s website indicates that it’s “set for release in 2012.” You can also check for updates on their Facebook page. I’ll definitely be looking for this one when it comes out.

Unlike other documentaries, Mehli Bilgil’s documentary contains no interviews, real world footage or image, not even a single shot of a PC or server. The clean and simple animation was made possible through the use of PICOL icons, which are basically minimalist icons that are now available for download at the PICOL website for free under a Creative Commons license.

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Unfortunately, like other documentaries, this one also requires its audience to have more than a basic understanding of computers and networking, which is ironic, considering the minimalist animation. But all in all it’s a great effort, one that I think can be improved simply by breaking the whole discussion into several bite-sized episodes so that there’s more room to define and clear things up.

[via The Clever Sheep]