Set in the near future with crime rampant on the streets of 'old' Detroit this is an exciting and satirical sci-fi fantasy.

Robot policemen are a fledgling idea, but inclined to go haywire at the drop of a connection.

So when cop Murphy (Peter Weller) is drilled to bits by the local mob, Morton (Miguel Ferrer), a brainbox as obsequious as he is obnoxious, reassembles him electronically to create the world's first RoboCop.

After preliminary skirmishes, in which RoboCop cleans up a few local hoodlums, the nub of the plot comes into play.

He starts to have recollections of the gang who obliterated him, who are in turn the henchmen of Jones (Ronny Cox), the man controlling the city's crime as well as being second-in-command of the company which built RoboCop, and now runs the local police.

This is an entertaining adult romp with the villains, Cox and Kurtwood Smith, coolly stealing the show.