The 10 biggest US box-office winners of 2017

This year at the movies has been a roller-coaster ride when it comes to the box office.

It was on a high at the beginning of the year, with surprise performers like “Get Out” and “Logan” holding court until Disney’s live-action remake “Beauty and the Beast” flexed its muscles.

Then the summer came and was pretty disappointing (especially in August), though there were some standouts like “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” “Spider-Man: Homecoming,” and “Wonder Woman.”

Now it's riding another high with the surprise September success of “It.”

It’s looking more and more like when 2017 comes to a close, the box office will match up to last year’s total gross and tickets sold (maybe even surpass it if “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” does beyond the monster business it's supposed to do).

Here are the 10 best box office earners so far this year.

Note: This selection is limited to only those titles released by the six major studios that have played in more than 2,000 screens for at least two weekends. Grosses below are all US earnings from Box Office Mojo.

10. “The Lego Batman Movie” — $175.7 million

Warner Bros.

Reported budget: $80 million

(Note: Production budgets are estimates and do not include expenses for marketing and release.)

9. “Dunkirk” — $186.3 million*

Warner Bros.

Reported budget: $100 million

*Movie is still playing in theaters.

8. “The Fate of the Furious” — $225.7 million

YouTube/Universal

Reported budget: $250 million

7. “Logan” — $226.2 million

20th Century Fox

Reported budget: $97 million

6. “Despicable Me 3” — $261.8 million*

Universal

Reported budget: $80 million

*Movie is still playing in theaters.

5. “It” — $268 million*

Warner Bros.

Reported budget: $35 million

*Movie is still playing in theaters.

4. “Spider-Man: Homecoming” — $331.9 million*

Sony

Reported budget: $175 million

*Movie is still playing in theaters.

3. “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” — $389.8 million

Marvel

Reported budget: $200 million

2. “Wonder Woman” — $412 million*

Wonder Woman on the battle fieldWarner Bros.

Reported budget: $149 million

*Movie is still playing in theaters.

1. “Beauty and the Beast” — $504 million

Disney

Reported budget: $160 million

Inside the numbers …

"It" has the power to keep raising up the box office chart.Brooke Palmer/Warner Bros.

You might notice that for some of the above titles, their domestic box office totals just skate past their production budgets (and if you count their marketing budgets, you could make the case these movies are in the red). But that’s when we turn to the all-important foreign gross.

The most striking is “The Fate of the Furious.” It made a healthy $225.7 million domestically, though it was made for $250 million. But its foreign take was a staggering $1.013 billion. That’s 81.8% of the movie’s worldwide gross. If you need a reason why Universal will make more “Fast & Furious” movies, you now have it.

“Dunkirk” is also getting a healthy amount of its gross from the foreign market. Warner Bros. is ecstatic that the movie made back its $100 million budget on its domestic earning alone ($186.3 million), but with $329.8 million from overseas it once again proves that director Christopher Nolan’s unique stories work worldwide (“Inception” and “Interstellar” both had strong international grosses).

But the title to look out for in the weeks to come is “It.” The horror film based on the Stephen King novel is opening in more and more foreign locations, and here domestically it has barely slipped in attendance, hovering just around a 50% decline from its opening weekend. It’s currently in fifth place of top domestic grossers this year and has only been in theaters for three weeks. As the word of mouth grows so could this title’s chances to getting into the top three.