''Beautiful Young Minds'' was a documentary first shown at the BRITDOC Festival on 26 July 2007 and first broadcast on

BBC 2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matter, incorporating genres such as comedy, drama and d ...

on 14 October 2007. The documentary follows the selection process and training for the U.K. team to compete in the 2006

International Mathematical Olympiad The International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) is a mathematical olympiad for pre-university students, and is the oldest of the International Science Olympiads. It is widely regarded as the most prestigious mathematical competition in the wor ...

(IMO), as well as the actual event in Slovenia. Many of the young mathematicians featured in the film had a form of

autism Autism, also known as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by differences or difficulties in social communication and interaction, a preference for predictability and routine, sensory processing d ...

, which the documentary links to mathematical ability. The team goes on to win numerous medals at the IMO, including four silver and one bronze. It was directed by

Morgan Matthews Morgan Matthews may refer to: * Morgan Matthews (figure skater), American ice dancer *Morgan Matthews (filmmaker) Morgan Matthews is an English, BAFTA award-winning documentary director. He is the founder of Minnow Films. Matthews' early work ...

, edited by Joby Gee and featured music by Sam Hooper. It was also screened at the Bath Film Festival in October 2007. The documentary inspired the 2014 film ''

X+Y XY, or xy, or any of its variants may refer to: Entertainment * ''Pokémon X and Y, Pokémon X'' and ''Y'', a pair of 2013 role-playing video games in the Pokémon video game series, ''Pokémon'' series * XY (magazine), ''XY'' (magazine), a gay ...

'', which was also directed by Morgan Matthews, based on IMO participant

Daniel Lightwing Daniel James Lightwing is a former mathematics child prodigy and co-founder of the London-based Internet/gambling business Castella Research, which uses high-frequency trading inspired methods to place bets on sports exchanges. He was previousl ...

Awards

References

External links

IMDb.com: Beautiful Young Minds
2007 television specials BBC television documentaries British English-language television shows International Mathematical Olympiad {{sci-documentary-stub