It’s important to get something straight up front: the updated “Robocop” (Rated PG-13; 118 min.) isn’t as good as the original.

Matching Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 sci-fi cult classic, which dealt with corruption and crime in a rapidly deteriorating Detroit, would have been a tall order. But as far as remakes go, Jose Padilha’s film provides proof new versions can work if executed well.

A few basic facts remain the same in the update; Alex Murphy (Joel Kinnaman) is still a police officer who gets taken down by organized crime. In the original, he’s gunned down in a bloody shooting sequence. In the new film, he’s nearly eviscerated by a car bomb. Murphy becomes Robocop, a cyborg created by Omni Consumer Products to be the perfect police officer — faster and stronger — but also fool the public into thinking Murphy’s emotions are still within his control, while secretly turning him into a full robot.

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The original was visionary in its picture of Detroit; the city is now bankrupt and has fallen on hard times. But instead of revisiting this concept, the new movie focuses more on a global scale. In a time where the public’s fears have turned to drones and national organizations spying on private citizens, a remake of ‘87’s “Robocop” is actually warranted.

Padilha and screenwriter Joshua Zetumer focus on Omnicorp’s struggle to get robots accepted by lawmakers and the public, and how CEO Raymond Sellars is willing to throw Murphy under the bus. Murphy turns against his directives and tries to solve his own murder, ultimately unearthing corruption in his old department. All of this is told through a frame television show, “The Novak Element,” hosted by Samuel L. Jackson’s Pat Novak — a Shakespearean chorus of sorts and a not-so-subtle jab at Bill O’Reilly — as another timely update to the film’s political relevance.

However, because the film is concerned with the bigger picture more than character interaction, several fine actors end up short shifted. Jackie Earle Haley, as a robotics expert who dislikes the idea of melding man and machine, doesn’t receive the development he deserves. Gary Oldman, as the doctor tasked with making the Robocop program work, doesn’t get to play as deep a character as he usually signs up for. Keaton is a decent villain but no one lives up to Kurtwood Smith as the original film’s Clarence Boddicker. Jackson, however, is up to the challenge and makes his few sequences count.

The visual effects are obviously more impressive than the original’s, but it would be unfair to reduce the new movie by calling it the original with a paint job slapped on. “Robocop” digs deeper than that; at the very least, it makes an effort to update Verhoeven’s themes. The movie may not live up to its ambitions but it doesn’t fall too far off the mark.