General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Fack ju Göhte 3

Fack ju Göhte 3 (international title: Suck Me Shakespeer 3) is a 2017 German comedy directed and written by Bora Dagtekin, and the third and final part of the Fack ju Göhte trilogy about the ex-convict turned teacher Zeki Müller and his problem class at Berlin's Goethe-Gesamtschule¹^•². It was released in German cinemas on 26 October 2017 and drew about 6.1 million moviegoers, although German critics received it markedly less warmly than its predecessors³^•⁴.

Key fact	Detail
Release	26 October 2017 in German cinemas; distributed by Constantin Film³
Director and writer	Bora Dagtekin, who also wrote and directed the first two films (2013 and 2015)¹
Admissions	6,136,279 in Germany (FFA figure as of December 2018)⁵
2017 box office rank	Second among all films distributed in Germany that year, with 23.4% of total domestic-film admissions⁶
Age rating	FSK 12⁷
Main cast	Elyas M'Barek (Zeki Müller), Jella Haase (Chantal), Sandra Hüller (Biggi Enzberger), Katja Riemann (Gudrun Gerster), Max von der Groeben (Danger)⁸
Critical scores	FILMSTARTS editorial rating 2.5 of 5; press average 2.6 of 5⁹

Spoilers

Plot

The story picks up with Zeki Müller (Elyas M'Barek) now established as a teacher, and his class 11b, including Chantal (Jella Haase), Danger (Max von der Groeben), and Zeynep (Gizem Emre), approaching the Abitur, the German school-leaving examination³. After a visit to the Berufsinformationszentrum, the federal employment agency's career information center, the students learn that the algorithmically suggested careers open to them, such as geriatric nursing and wastewater technology, hold little appeal, and their motivation collapses¹³.

A ministry inspection leaves the Goethe-Gesamtschule with a disastrous report and the threat of closure. To survive, the school must meet a catalog of conditions within four weeks: at least five new enrollments for the coming school year, a music scholarship for a senior student, a viral anti-bullying campaign, an award for the student newspaper "Klassenfurz", and, most demanding of all, proof from every student in Zeki's class that they are ready for the upper secondary level in a special aptitude test¹³^•¹². Principal Gudrun Gerster (Katja Riemann) puts teachers and students under pressure, and the new anti-bullying officer Biggi Enzberger (Sandra Hüller), effectively the replacement for Karoline Herfurth's character from the earlier films, monitors Zeki's unconventional methods¹³^•⁸. Subplots touch on a suicide pact planned over an internet chat, refugee integration, and remarks about the AfD, elements several critics read as the film showing cultural openness alongside its coarse humor⁹.

Production

The film was produced by Constantin Film, with Lena Schömann and Bora Dagtekin as producers and Martin Moszkowicz as executive producer⁷. Dagtekin, who had created the series with Fack ju Göhte (2013) and Fack ju Göhte 2 (2015), conceived the third film as the conclusion of the trilogy⁸. It received €500,000 in funding from Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, and the Czech distribution record lists support from FFFB, MBB, FFA, and DFFF¹⁰^•¹¹.

Reported running times differ between sources: the epd Film listing gives 115 minutes, kino.de describes 119 minutes, and Cineuropa and Rotten Tomatoes list 120 minutes¹^•¹²^•². All agree that the finale runs noticeably longer than its predecessors¹².

Box office

The opening day drew 280,000 admissions in 778 reporting cinemas for about €2.4 million, the best opening day of the German cinema year to that point and the best opening day for a German film since Fack Ju Göhte 2 more than two years earlier¹⁴.

Final German admissions reached 6,136,279 according to the FFA figure as of December 2018⁵. A European cinema report for 2017 records 6,000,809 admissions and a gross of €52,280,788, equal to 23.4% of all domestic-film admissions in Germany that year and second place among all films distributed in 2017⁶. The first two films had drawn 7.3 and 7.7 million admissions, placing them fourth and fifth among the most-attended films of their decade in Germany, so the finale fell short of both predecessors¹³.

Critical reception

German critics were substantially less positive than audiences. The FILMSTARTS editorial review rated the film 2.5 of 5, calling it a loosely connected revue of individual gags that loses focus after a strong opening, and the aggregated press average stood at 2.6 of 5⁹^•¹³. Barbara Schweizerhof in epd Film judged that the film merely repeats the series' recipe of coarse schoolyard humor, quick one-liners, and winning performers, rating it 2 of 5¹. Antje Wessels wrote that for the first time in the series the film sinks into noticeable redundancy, while Falk Straub of Kino-Zeit described it as an exhausting experience built toward one crude highlight after the next⁹.

Some reviewers defended it. Christian Henning of Bild called it the best part of the trilogy, praising its treatment of bullying, and Katja Belousova of Die Welt credited the film with an idealism in which characters like Chantal and Danger can earn their Abitur¹⁵. On Rotten Tomatoes the film's Tomatometer stood at 61 percent¹⁶; FOCUS online reported a score of 65 percent on the platform and described it as weak compared with the predecessors⁴.

Home media and aftermath

Constantin Film released the film on DVD and Blu-ray on 22 March 2018, with a trilogy fan box following on 6 September 2018⁵. Although the film was designed as the trilogy's conclusion, Dagtekin said in the part-three press kit that he had also declared the first and second films final, adding that he "would not want to rule out one hundred percent that the franchise will live on at some point, in some form"¹⁷.

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Franchise and series entries as standalone works › Teen and comedy series film entries › Entries released in the 2010s

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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