LOS ANGELES, June 11 (Xinhua) -- Paramount Pictures' sci-fi action film "Transformers: Rise of the Beasts" led ticket sales at the North American box office with an estimated three-day cume of 60.5 million U.S. dollars on its opening weekend, showed figures from the measurement firm Comscore on Sunday.

The film is the seventh entry in the Transformers franchise that debuted in 2007. It's a standalone sequel to 2018's "Bumblebee" and prequel to the original Transformers film.

Directed by Steven Caple Jr. and starring Anthony Ramos and Dominique Fishback, the film will take audiences on a globetrotting adventure with the Autobots and introduce a whole new faction of Transformers -- the Maximals -- to join them as allies in the existing battle for Earth.

"Transformers: Rise of the Beasts" holds an approval rating of 52 percent, which is based on 157 reviews to date on the review-aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes. It earned an "A-" on an "A+" to "F" scale from audiences polled by the market research firm CinemaScore.

The blockbuster also opened at No. 1 internationally with 110 million dollars from 68 international markets for a global total of 170.5 million dollars, including about 39 million dollars from the Chinese mainland.

Sony's animated superhero film "Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse" dropped to second place with 55.4 million dollars on its second weekend for a North American total of 225.4 million dollars. The film has grossed 390 million dollars so far worldwide.

Rounding out the top three, Disney's live-action remake of "The Little Mermaid" took in 22.8 million dollars through the three-day frame for a North American cume of 228.8 million dollars.