Six brothers unallowed out of their New York home for decades become heroes

They've been described as "a lost tribe" - six brothers growing up in the heart of New York City, who were rarely allowed out of their tiny apartment. Now though, the Angulo brothers have been "found" as the subjects of an award-winning documentary, The Wolfpack. The boys - Bhagavan, Govinda, Naryana, Mukunda, Krsna and Jagadisa, ranging in age from 23 to 16 - were home-schooled by their parents, Oscar and Susanne. After hearing guns go off when the family first moved to the Bronx, Oscar Angulo, a former Macchu Picchu tour guide, believed that the world was a dangerous and hostile place. His children, the six boys and a sister who is mostly off-screen, usually left their home only once or twice a year. Mukunda Angulo, now 20, explains how they managed to function within their environment. The group of brothers spent much of their time making home movies featuring famous characters "(We) made up our own world that we could escape into. Our father is a huge crime and horror film fan, and we would just learn the scripts off by heart, or re-create the DVDs we watched. Reservoir Dogs and The Godfather - they're some of our favourites. We would make costumes and props. Actually, we made such a good foam gun once, the cops actually thought it was real." It took Mukunda's "escape" from the house in 2010, wearing a Michael Meyers Halloween mask, for the boys to pressurise their father into letting them out into the world. And it was during this time that a young music video director and documentary film-maker, Crystal Moselle, met the boys, "running past me on the sidewalk on the Lower East side". "They all had long hair and sunglasses, and something about them intrigued me - they were like a gang," she recalls. Life on the outside has not been as hostile as they had been led to believe "I ran after them just on instinct and caught up with them at a pedestrian crossing. I said I was a film-maker and they said they were also interested in making films... so we arranged to meet up sometime." The fact that the boys were experiencing their first weeks in the outside world was something Moselle only realised gradually: "Mukunda told me I was their first guest when I went to their apartment, and later their first friend. "I was in awe; it almost felt as if I had discovered a lost tribe." The director adds that it was only as their friendship flourished, and the idea for the documentary was gradually formed, that she began to suspect there was what she calls "a dark side" to the way they had grown up. "I was blinded by their charm and their creativity at first. And they were well-adjusted, well-cared for, and well-educated, particularly by their mother. If I had come into their lives a year earlier it might have been different, but by the time I appeared they had begun their rebellion against their father's rules and didn't seem to need my help. It took me a while to figure out what had been happening." Govinda Angulo, 22, recalls his father's caution. "Our father warned us that everyone was out to get us, that we couldn't let our guard down, that the world was hostile. In fact everyone we've met has been so nice; that's been the biggest surprise about our new lives. "I think there was one year, the year of 9/11, where we didn't leave at all. I think that event really confirmed all my father's worst fears about the world, and it happened on our doorstep. But everyone I have met has been so kind." The youngest of the boys, 16-year-old Jagadisa, who has now changed his name to Eddie, says that his biggest surprise "was all the technology out there. I'm really interested in the 1980s and I guess I was disappointed that it wasn't 1985 out there". Mukunda says his parents were enthusiastic about the documentary, "knowing what it could mean for us. We were aware of the power of the camera, of course, and we know there's a potential audience of millions online. We were happy at the idea of an audience - we just didn't realise how big it would get". Made up of real-time filming and the brothers' vast archive of home movies, including recreations of their favourite films, The Wolfpack won best documentary at this year's Sundance Film Festival. It's also received lavish praise from critics, including a five-star review from The Guardian which said that "any kid who has never known more than 15ft of personal space, and can make a Batman costume out of old cereal boxes look that good, is well-deserving of our wonderment". The boys report that home life has improved for the whole family since the documentary process began, and their parents too are living a more "normal" life. All the brothers are now pursuing careers in the creative industries, and have created a company, Wolfpack Productions, to further their joint ambitions. "All of them have been in the outside world now for nearly five years," Moselle says. "I think in their case, isolation has unleashed their creativity. They've had all this time and they've learned to be meticulous and patient. They were given films to pass the time and they went beyond that, creating worlds they can escape into. It's been self-medicating and very therapeutic. BBC