My father, an infantry soldier in the Battle of the Bulge and several other European theater battles, thought that Saving Private Ryan was the most realistic depiction of war he had seen in any non-documentary film. It really shook him up to watch it. I thought it was an excellent war film.
When I was 13, he took me to the movie theater to see Battle of the Bulge (1965). Towards the end he was so angry he stood up in the theater and yelled about how that's not the way the battle was fought. I just rewatched the film yesterday for the first time since then, and I have to say it is probably one of the worst depictions of war - a true Hollywood treatment with all the ridiculous cliches.