THE WOLFPACK (Crystal Moselle, U.S.). 86 minutes. Rating: NNN
Raiders! isn’t the only Hot Docs entry in which rambunctious kids recreate a beloved movie. The six Angulo brothers (aided occasionally by their sister) spent a great deal of their adolescence in their New York apartment making charmingly threadbare camcorder versions of their favourite features, including Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs and Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy. The rest of the time was spent watching movies their father, Oscar, would bring home for them – because he almost never allowed his children to venture outside.
The reasons for Oscar’s hermetic attitude, and the issues that generated it, are introduced fairly late in The Wolfpack, radically changing the documentary’s tone as director Crystal Moselle struggles with the larger ramifications of the Angulos’ living situation.
It’s a fascinating story however you present it, but a tighter structure and a little more context wouldn’t have hurt.
