Jacques Villeneuve, 1997 F1 world champion, reflects on the deeper lessons he absorbed from his late father, Gilles Villeneuve, ahead of the new biopic Villeneuve: Rise of a Legend. Contrary to popular belief, Jacques never saw himself as carrying on his father’s legacy, but now recognizes he inherited something fundamental from Gilles: a relentless drive to prove, “I can do this, you can’t.”
Gilles Villeneuve’s tragic death at 32, and his spectacular, fearless driving style, cemented his place as a motorsport icon. Yet, Jacques reveals that his own journey in racing was never about finishing what Gilles started: “I loved my dad. I’m proud of him… But I’m doing my own thing. I’m not racing because I want to be the continuation of Gilles Villeneuve.”
Growing up largely apart from his father due to Gilles’ racing commitments, Jacques developed his own approach to the sport, focusing on personal passion rather than living up to expectations. “If you’re doing this sport for the wrong reason, you’ll never achieve it,” he explains. “You have to really, personally, yourself, deep down, love it. Willing to take the punches because you get a lot of punches.”
Still, Jacques acknowledges that his father’s attitude toward risk, competition, and pushing the limits—“I can do this, you can’t”—profoundly shaped his own mindset. “He was at home exactly the same way as he was at the racetrack… Always wanting to beat the next challenge. And often doing it just to show the other guys, ‘I can do it, you can’t.’ That was his life story.”
With a new film set to explore the untold story of Gilles’s formative years, Jacques is reconnecting with his father’s legacy from a fresh perspective: “People have opened up about their time with my dad… And the picture I’m getting is so different than the one I got from my mother.”
Villeneuve: Rise of a Legend premieres at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 19th, with a global release to follow next year, 50 years after Gilles’s F1 debut.
