Matt Dillon will juggle directing and acting roles in Beneath the Banyan Trees, a con man caper in which the actor will co-star alongside James Caan. Although Dillon directed an episode of the TV series Oz in 1999, the film will mark the actor's debut behind the camera on a feature film.

Dillon also co-wrote the script with pulp novelist Barry Gifford, the man responsible for the wild antics of both Wild at Heart and Lost Highway. Having been stalled in pre-production for nearly a year, the picture (which was originally titled City of Ghosts) has now received the green light to start shooting.

Dillon, now 36, became a youth icon in the 80s with roles in Francis Coppola's The Outsiders and Rumble Fish and an acclaimed turn in Gus Van Sant's Drugstore Cowboy. After fading out of fashion during the 90s, he turned an ailing career around with roles in the steamy noir thriller Wild Things and the Farrelly brothers' hugely popular There's Something About Mary.

Production on Beneath the Banyan Trees, which tells the tale of an insurance scammer (Dillon) on the trail of his duplicitous former partner (Caan) in the jungles of Cambodia, begins early next month.