Jared Leto is direct­ing a thriller based on a script by James Ellroy

He’s an Oscar-win­ning movie star and the front­man of a plat­inum-sell­ing rock band – and now Jared Leto is adding ​‘fea­ture film­mak­er’ to his résumé. Vari­ety reports that the he has signed a deal with Para­mount Pic­tures to direct 77, a thriller based on the true sto­ry of Cal­i­forn­ian heiress Pat­ty Hearst who was kid­napped in 1974.

The film is based on an orig­i­nal script from James Ell­roy, the pro­lif­ic Amer­i­can crime writer who has pre­vi­ous­ly pro­vid­ed treat­ments for LA Con­fi­den­tial, The Black Dahlia, Ram­part and oth­ers. It fol­lows the sto­ry of two cops who team up to recov­er the miss­ing grand­daugh­ter of Amer­i­can pub­lish­ing mag­nate William Ran­dolph Hearst, while also inves­ti­gat­ing the gris­ly mur­der of a fel­low police offi­cer. Dur­ing their search for the miss­ing woman the duo uncov­er cor­rup­tion, cov­er-ups and a dark conspiracy.

Although Leto has nev­er made a fea­ture before, this won’t be his first time occu­py­ing the director’s chair. In 2012 he direct­ed Arti­fact, a doc­u­men­tary about his band, Thir­ty Sec­onds to Mars, which he released under the pseu­do­nym Bartholomew Cub­bins. The film won the People’s Choice Award at the Toron­to Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val. He’s also direct­ed a hand­ful of music videos and doc­u­men­tary shorts, main­ly about his own music career.

If you’re not entire­ly sold on the prospect of a Leto-helmed Hol­ly­wood thriller, it may be worth remem­ber­ing that he’s worked with some pret­ty impres­sive direc­tors over the course of his film career, includ­ing David Finch­er (on Fight Club and Pan­ic Room), Dar­ren Aronof­sky (on Requiem for a Dream) and Ter­rence Mal­ick (on The Thin Red Line). We’ll give the Dal­las Buy­ers Club and Sui­cide Squad star the ben­e­fit of the doubt for now and hope that some of that film­mak­ing mag­ic has rubbed off on him.