The film portrays the career of Yoichi Hatta, a civil engineer active in Japanese Taiwan, and his interactions with the native Taiwanese.

It was financed as a commemoration of the 115th anniversary of the Hokkoku Shimbun, a newspaper in Hatta's hometown of Kanazawa, and produced by Mushi Productions.

The film's title is derived from Patten lai-a, the Taiwanese term for "Hatta has come," (Chinese: 八田來; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Pat-tiân lâi--ah).

But among them, a boy named Yingzhe is moved by Hatta's conviction in his project and comes to understand the necessity of a dam and wishes to become a civil engineer as well.

was released on November 13, 2009 in Taiwan with a mixed Mandarin-Taiwanese dub (with some theaters opting for the original Japanese voices with Chinese subtitles).