Back in May, rapper Cage dropped his Shia LaBeouf-directed video, “I Never Knew You,” which was the young actor’s debut as a music video director. But, there’s more to the story than just directing a music video for a friend.

Both have been friends for years, and Shia’s goal — in collaborating with Cage for a music video — isn’t about getting into the music world. It’s about making a movie … about Cage.

In an interview with MTV, the actor revealed that he’s been a fan of Cage for some time, and reached out to him over four years ago with a film idea.

“Like four years ago, I got in touch with him. It was super Hollywood, like an ‘I’ll have my people call your people’ type of thing. But his people really didn’t exist in the form of my people,” Shia laughed.

After that, he followed Cage on his Hell’s Winter Tour, and shot a bunch of footage, after which he felt Cage’s story would make a great movie.

“I came out during the Hell’s Winter Tour and started filming him on that tour for, like, weeks and weeks — almost two months. We just jumped around, city to city, and we became friends that way,” Shia explained. “Yes, I’m a fan, and I wanted to see him perform, but I’d always wanted to make a movie about him since forever. And so the plan was to take that Hell’s Winter footage and go pitch the movie.”

A reserved Cage feels a little shy about the whole thing, saying its strange to even think about it.

It’s really strange. I try not to think about it,” the rapper said in a recent interview with Decider.com. I don’t talk about myself in the third person, but I try to think about myself in third person when we’re talking about the Cage movie. I try to keep myself separated from it. There’s nothing worse than the first few years of getting restless; you just feel like an asshole thinking, ‘C’mon, when is this movie going to be made about me!’”

There’s not a time frame, or schedule for this project, but neither are worried. Shia plans to continue filming, and pitching the film, and says as Cage’s profile raises, it’ll be easier to get investors onboard.

However, he feels Cage’s story will sell the movie itself.

“I want them to know everything,” Shia explained of Cage’s story, which includes drug use, physical abuse and a stint in a mental institution. “If you could just picture getting handed the sh**tiest cards, over and over again, and having to play with them. When I listen to Cage’s music [no matter how bad things are], it’s like my life is not that bad.”