Police Academy 3: Back in Training

In an unnamed city, the governor announces that, for budget reasons, one of the states' two police academies, run by Commandant Eric Lassard and Commandant Mauser, respectively, is to be closed. Mauser and his dim-witted captain, Proctor, conspire with men from Lassard's academy, the unscrupulous Chad Copeland and Kyle Blankes, to ensure it fails in exchange for career promotions. Alongside his current instructors—the glamorous lieutenant Callahan, soft-spoken Laverne Hooks, and prankster Larvell Jones—Lassard calls on his successful former cadets to serve as trainers: the laidback Carey Mahoney, the towering Moses Hightower, and gun fanatic Eugene Tackleberry.

The new recruits arrive for training, including bumbling Sergeant Fackler's wife, Violet, the meek Sweetchuck, erratic but reformed former gangleader Zed, whom used to harass Sweetchuck's business, Tackleberry's brother-in-law Bud Kirkland, and the beautiful Karen Adams, to whom Mahoney is attracted. Mauser sends Tomoko Nogata, an officer on an exchange program from Tachikawa, Tokyo, to join Lassard's recruits, because of his ethnicity and broken English.

The cadets undergo several weeks of training, during which Nogata becomes smitten with Callahan, who is impressed by his combat skills. Meanwhile, Sweetchuck, overwhelmed by the stress of sharing a room with the chaotic Zed, decides to quit. However, Tackleberry persuades him to stay, promising to protect him and train him into an effective officer. During a training exercise, the recruits' bumbling efforts fail to impress the oversight committee tasked with deciding the fate of the academies. Despite this, Bud redeems their performance by winning the inter-academy boxing challenge. Meanwhile, Mauser assigns Copeland and Blankes to sabotage the recruits by disrupting their sleep and forcing them into early field work in front of the committee. This leads to one member being briefly abducted by Zed's old gang, and Violet flipping a police car during a pursuit. Later, when Mauser arrives at a bar to mock Mahoney and his colleagues for their failures, they retaliate by applying strong tape to his eyes, which removes his eyebrows when taken off.

Lassard and Mahoney raise the cadets' morale with speechs affirming their belief that the cadets can succeed, leading to Karen reciprocating Mahoney's attraction. Later, Tomoko uses Larvell's advice to seduce Callahan. At the policepersons' ball, following insults from Proctor, Mahoney asks his old prostitute friend to trick him into stripping naked before locking him out of his hotel room. Proctor tries to flee back to the academy, but accidentally enters the Blue Oyster Bar, a gay biker establishment. Meanwhile, Mauser's incessant fawning over the committee leads Commissioner Hurst to reveal that Lassard's academy has not impressed the members. After he gloats to Lassard over his almost assured victory, Mahoney tells the attendees and the committee that Mauser has suggested ignoring the previous weeks' failures and basing the winning academy on the final day's field activities.

Copeland and Blankes manipulate the computer systems to send officers to the wrong location, but Laverne catches them and knocks them out. Meanwhile, at the governor's ball, Lassard's cadet, Hedges, alerts his fellow officers that armed thieves are assaulting the guests. Lassard chooses to abandon the evaluation to save his recruit, while Mauser dismisses the alert as a prank. Lassard's officers work together, including Zed and Sweetchuck, to subdue the dirtbag and rescue the governor, securing the future of Lassard's academy and its graduating cadets.

• Steve Guttenberg as Sergeant Carey Mahoney
• Bubba Smith as Sergeant Moses Hightower
• David Graf as Sergeant Eugene Tackleberry
• Michael Winslow as Sergeant Larvell Jones
• Leslie Easterbrook as Lieutenant Debbie Callahan
• Marion Ramsey as Sergeant Laverne Hooks
• Bruce Mahler as Sergeant Douglas Fackler
• George Gaynes as Commandant Eric Lassard
• Scott Thomson as Sergeant Chad Copeland
• Brant von Hoffman as Sergeant Kyle Blankes

• Art Metrano as Commandant Ernie Mauser
• Lance Kinsey as Captain Carl Proctor

• Debralee Scott as Cadet Violet Fackler
• Tim Kazurinsky as Cadet Carl Sweetchuck
• Brian Tochi as Cadet Tomoko Nogata
• Andrew Paris as Cadet Bud Kirkland
• Bobcat Goldthwait as Cadet Zed McGlunk
• Shawn Weatherly as Cadet Karen Adams
• David Huband as Cadet Hedges
• Marcia Watkins as Cadet Sarah

• R. Christopher Thomas as Cadet Baxter #1
• David James Elliott as Cadet Baxter #2

• George R. Robertson as Commissioner Henry Hurst
• Ed Nelson as Governor Neilson
• Georgina Spelvin as Hooker
• Arthur Batanides as Mr. Kirkland
• Chas Lawther as Mr. Delaney
• Doug Lennox as Main Bad Guy
• TJ Scott as Robber
• Jerry Paris as Priest

As with other films in the series, the film was shot primarily in Toronto, Ontario, Canada ^{[citation needed]}. The city skyline is clearly identifiable in the concluding 'yacht club' scenes. There is also the scene where the female recruit drives the police car up and over a dirt pile out of an alley. At the end of the alley, there is a Toronto Sun paper box. The city grid shown on the computerized dispatch system also shows a map of downtown Toronto streets, with the detail bordering between Trinity, Yonge, and Queen streets, and the Gardiner Expressway. In the scene in which Tackleberry shoots out the television screen with his gun, a Canada Dry soda machine is visible in the background next to a 'C' Plus soda machine, an orange-flavoured sparkling beverage that is only sold in Canada.

The film debuted at number one at the box office in the United States.^[3] The film grossed $43,579,163 in the United States making it the 17th highest-grossing film of 1986 in the United States.^[4] It faced stiff box office competition from many other high-profile comedy films released early that year such as Back To School, Ruthless People, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Down And Out In Beverly Hills, Legal Eagles, Short Circuit, Running Scared, The Money Pit, Gung Ho, Hannah and Her Sisters, Wildcats, and Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling. The film grossed $107,639,000 worldwide from a budget of $12 million.^[1]

On Rotten Tomatoes, it has an approval rating of 36% based on reviews from 11 critics.^[5] On Metacritic, it has a score of 33 out of 100 based on reviews from 8 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".^[6] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film a grade B+.^[7]

Variety wrote: "Cast of cartoon misfits is still basically intact and if Police Academy 3 has any charm it's in the good-natured dopeyness of these people. No bones about it, these people are there to laugh at."^[8] Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times wrote: "The most you can say for Police Academy 3: Back in Training (citywide) is that it's no worse than Police Academy 2—which was awful."^[9]

• Official website
• Police Academy 3: Back in Training at IMDb
• Police Academy 3: Back in Training at the TCM Movie Database
• Police Academy 3: Back in Training at AllMovie