Daddysitter is a Filipino drama film directed by Christian Paolo Lat. The story centers on Mara, a struggling college student whose financial burdens become overwhelming, especially with her brother’s tuition fees to worry about. In order to make ends meet, Mara is introduced to the idea of “daddysitting,” a kind of sugar-dating arrangement where she spends time with older, wealthier men in exchange for support.

Through a friend, Mara meets Ryan, a wealthy older man with fragile health, who becomes a client and starts offering her help. At first, the arrangement is uncomfortable and fraught with awkwardness — Mara is aware of the power imbalance, and she wrestles with her own dignity and the ethics of what she’s agreement. But as she spends more time with Ryan, she begins to see a more human side of him: his vulnerability, kindness, and how much of his identity is tied up in his wealth and his legacy.

Complications arise when Joseph, Ryan’s estranged son, enters the picture. Joseph is entitled and manipulative, seeing Mara as a means to speed up his inheritance from his father. He pressures Mara, using leverage and threats, which throws her into a moral conflict: whether to stay loyal to the kindness Ryan has shown or protect her own principles and safety. Mara is torn between needing the financial security that the arrangement offers and not wanting to become a pawn in someone else’s scheme.

The film explores themes like the cost of poverty, power imbalance, loyalty, and how desperation can force people into compromising positions. It isn’t cowed by the complexity of Mara’s situation: her decisions are not portrayed as purely good or bad. Instead, the movie highlights her agency, her doubts, her judgment calls, and the emotional toll each choice takes.

Visually and tonally, Daddysitter uses intimacy and tension — in conversations, in silences, in the contrast between wealth and Mara’s financial precarity. The older mansions, quiet moments with Ryan, and the shadow of Joseph’s demands all combine to create a mood of unease and moral ambivalence.

In the end, Daddysitter is less about judging Mara and more about showing what life can demand from someone with limited choices. It questions how we define “survival,” what compromises are acceptable, and how, even when people expect you to compromise, you can still try to retain self-respect — or figure out what that even means when you’re under pressure.