An offbeat romantic comedy about a decent guy, Ray Tuckby, with a dead-end life in the dead-end town of Trona, CA. After encouragement from a stranger whom he happens upon, Ray begins to dream again. He sheds the parasites in his life, musters the nerve to pursue his childhood love, and finally takes back his community by toppling the local teenage Meth-baron.
Whimsy and the macabre are the operating systems in Just Add Water, and they're not always complementary.
– John Anderson,
Variety,
27 Mar 2008
rotten:
Walsh nearly redeems the whole thing: His eyes flicker with an intelligence that isn't in the script, and he graces his character with layers of inner life in a film that coasts on surfaces.