Picture Credit: Netflix
To become a conspiracy theorist is one of the top ten most embarrassing things anyone can become. But when it’s your parents, it’s simply depressing. The Netflix psychological thriller from Spain, The Truthers, tries to investigate this through a father-daughter’s newfound estrangement following the passing of her mother plus his paranoid attachment towards pharmaceutical companies. The conspiracy thriller archetype of The Truthers fails to achieve much, despite a convincing dissection of one’s unraveling through an increasing sense of paranoia.
A Spaniard named Ruth (Stéphanie Magnin) lives a moderate life as a bartender in Berlin. She hasn’t spoken to her parents in a while but suddenly begins receiving frequent calls. When she gets the call that her mother, Lucía (Fanny Gautier), has died in a freak accident, she rushes back to her Spanish hometown. Her father, Martín (José Coronado), a former Civil Guard officer, tells her the tragedy: Lucía had been drinking wine, took a bath with the doors locked, and upon getting out, fell and died on impact. Everyone tells her it was just an accident, but Ruth suspects her mother couldn’t have died so meaninglessly. Her suspicions grow considering she never knew her mom had been drinking or had become an alcoholic in her absence. Those “?” hovering over her quickly turn into “?!” when she discovers Martín has been hyperfixated on finding a missing boy and accusing a local pharmaceutical company, Certyx, of his disappearance, rather than grieving his late wife.
LOS CREYENTES. Stéphanie Magnin as Ruth in LOS CREYENTES. Cr. Matias Uris/Netflix © 2025
It doesn’t help that throughout her time there, her father has drunk the conspiracy theorist Kool-Aid completely and transformed into someone she doesn’t even recognize: cursing frequently in front of her, listening to podcasts and watching videos he calls “research,” shooting guns, hiding cameras in the house, spending time with a new lady friend Berta (Mabel Del Pozo), and locking himself in his attic. And so, she begins to believe that her own father had something to do with her mother’s death.
The Truthers fully engages you in Ruth’s plight, heightening the unease with each red flag her father raises. If you’re the offspring of any parent who has gone down the paranoia rabbit hole, screenwriters Carlos Montero and Darío Madrona precisely nail how easily parents can fall susceptible to widespread misinformation in the digital age—becoming shells of their former selves and fracturing their relationships with their children. If you’re watching the film as a character study rather than a thriller, it succeeds on that front. In every conversation, Martín is mere seconds away from airing his uninformed opinions about Certyx, insisting the company is kidnapping children and lying to everyone. Yes, plenty of corporations are guilty of socioeconomic crimes, but Martín’s approach doesn’t stray far from a QAnon psycho.
Across the film, Ruth tries to reconnect with her ex-boyfriend Arón (Alberto Olmo), who has cancer and works as a janitor at Certyx. One of the strongest and most harrowing scenes comes when Ruth brings him home for dinner, and Martín projects all his misinformation onto him—it’s as uncomfortable as it is deeply sad.
Stéphanie Magnin and José Coronado powerfully ground the burdening weight and tragedy of this unraveling father‑daughter relationship in their performances. Coronado spews Martín’s ramblings with such assured confidence and sternness that it becomes genuinely infuriating the longer it goes on, while Magnin gradually unravels at the seams, bolstering the film’s suspense. She delivers an effective illustration of the crushing pressure she’s contending with during her depressing homecoming. There’s so much weight hovering over Ruth, and Magnin carries her intense feelings through real, grounded emotion.
The Truthers also really makes good use of its mystery elements on an art and technical front. By juxtaposing the grimness of the narrative, cinematographer Juana Jiménez creates a vibrant, colorful beauty in Spain, even in the most mundane of locations. Plus, the production design on Ruth’s sprawling childhood house makes for a good foreground to the film’s underlying mystery—at least more so than its execution.
LOS CREYENTES. Stéphanie Magnin as Ruth, Jose Coronado as Martín in LOS CREYENTES. Cr. Matias Uris/Netflix © 2025
The Truthers‘ one‑note plotting makes it difficult to keep the audience invested or create a gripping mystery. The story sees Ruth walking in circles, collecting Martín’s red flags at nearly every narrative corner. Though the film seems to think it’s deepening, it’s really just spinning its wheels. Director Roger Gual manages to craft a discomforting atmosphere with well‑developed tension, but Montero and Madrona’s script never scratches beneath the surface of its premise or characters. It mines the disparity between the father‑daughter relationship in only one direction while actively undermining the mystery behind Lucía’s death. The psychological thriller framework feels ineffective, lacking any real urgency.
If you strip away Ruth and Martín’s psychological cat‑and‑mouse game, there’s not much at the center. The leads become more mouthpieces for the film’s themes than fully functioning characters, which is a disservice given the actors’ potent portrayals. The same goes for the underdeveloped supporting cast—Arón and Berta are cardboard cutouts, only serving to prop up dramatic elements. While it tries to spark a conversation about the harm of conspiracy theorists, the sights are set pretty narrowly. And then it takes a questionable final-act turn that raises more questions than answers, with little groundwork laid to earn its last swing.
It’s frustrating because The Truthers has a solid, suspenseful foundation coupled with a strong performance in Magnin. But with the way it meanders as straightforwardly as it does, coupled with an underdeveloped story, this psychological conspiracy thriller is nothing more than a generic tale that could’ve lived up to its potential.