After several years of decline in the 1970s, during which Busch Gardens in Williamsburg opened less than an hour's drive away, Ocean View Amusement Park was closed after Labor Day, 1978 and was torn down soon after the filming of a 1979 made-for-TV movie called "The Death of Ocean View Park", which starred Mike Connors of "Mannix" fame, Barry Newman, and Academy Award winner Martin Landau. A key scene featured blowing up the landmark wooden roller coaster "The Rocket". While there had been popular concern as to the structural integrity of the famous but aged wooden structure, early attempts to film its destruction with explosives met with failure. Finally, on the third attempt, and with a bulldozer off camera helping to pull the structure down, the landmark appeared to explode in a large fireball. Also, the 1977 movie "Rollercoaster" (with Timothy Bottoms), George Segal, Henry Fonda, and Richard Widmark, features "The Rocket", as well as other shots of the park in the opening sequences.