The year is 1917, and under Japanese occupation, Taiwan suffers from terrible drought and famine. Residents of the Chianan Plain live in squalor, their lives defined by the daily struggle of carting water home. When Yoichi Hatta, a Japanese civil engineer, arrives with a plan to reshape the area's irrigation dramatically, the local residents are quick to call him a liar. Xu Yingzhe, the son of a poor farmer, takes issue with the outright rejection of Hatta's plan and tries to reason and grasp the situation. Hatta's scheme may seem crazy, but it could be the very thing that improves the strenuous lives of the Taiwanese people. [Written by MAL Rewrite]

Batain Lai!! Minami no Shima no Mizu Monogatari won the 23rd Japan Society of Civil Engineers' Cinema Committee's Most Excellent award. The movie premiered in Japan as Pattenrai!! ~ Minami no Shima no Mizu Monogatari (パッテンライ!!　～南の島の水ものがたり～) on November 15, 2008. It was released in Taiwan with mixed Taiwanese-Mandarin dub on November 13, 2009; with some cinemas offering the original Japanese dub and Chinese subtitles. Special Taiwanese premieres of the movie were screened in Tainan on November 4, 2009, attended by the former president Ma Ying-jeou; and in Taipei on November 9, 2009, attended by the former president Lee Teng-hui.