One of my pet irritations with Hollywood war movies is the fire and flame associated with explosions. Kids have come to expect it without knowing that genuine military explosives produce practically no flash. Gasoline is cheap and it seems Hollywood has an abundance of it to jazz up explosions.
I recently caught "Sands of Iwo Jima" on TV ... I was struck by how dark the explosions during the beach landing scenes were. Looked like a bunch of dirt getting tossed in the air, not like a bunch of burning organic chemicals. They looked a lot more like real explosions I've seen than the usual hollywood fare today.