Editing David Holzman's Diary (section)

=== Relations Between Public and Private ===
One key part of this film's engagement with art and life is its depiction of relations between public and private, relations that are gendered. As James Latham writes, David uses his film project partly to assert power over women; to spy on them, stalk them, and record them with or without permission, and thereby to potentially make those images public. Part of David's motivation for asserting this power, Latham writes, is that he is experiencing flipped gender roles, or "patriarchy in crisis."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Latham |first1=James |title='Your Life is Not a Very Good Script': David Holzman's Diary and Documentary Expression in Late-1960s America and Beyond |journal=Post Script |date=Summer 2007 |volume=26 |issue=3 |page=29}}</ref> In an era when women (as well as people of color and members of the LGBT community) are gradually gaining some power in public spaces, David "represents the growing realization that male power over women is waning."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Latham |first1=James |title='Your Life is Not a Very Good Script': David Holzman's Diary and Documentary Expression in Late-1960s America and Beyond |journal=Post Script |date=Summer 2007 |volume=26 |issue=3 |page=29}}</ref> Whereas Sandra, Penny, and the anonymous subway woman "are independent and associated with the outside man's world, David is comparatively needy, impotent, and isolated in his small inner world. [Only the "Thunderbird Lady"] is willing to indulge him, except she is too liberated and aggressive for David."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Latham |first1=James |title='Your Life is Not a Very Good Script': David Holzman's Diary and Documentary Expression in Late-1960s America and Beyond |journal=Post Script |date=Summer 2007 |volume=26 |issue=3 |page=29}}</ref>

Many writers have noted the film's clear references to ''[[Rear Window]]'' (1954) and ''[[Peeping Tom (1960 film)|Peeping Tom]]'' (1960) and their related issues. Jonathan Rosenbaum writes, for example, that these films examine "notions of the camera as a probing instrument, especially in relation to voyeurism and other forms of aggressive sexual appropriation as well as self-scrutiny."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rosenbaum |first1=Jonathan |title=David Holzman's Diary/My Girlfriend's Wedding: Historical Artifacts of the Past and Present |website=JonathanRosenbaum.net |date=14 October 2006 |url=https://www.jonathanrosenbaum.net}}</ref> Other critics note the public-private irony of fashion model Penny being unwilling to appear in David's film; or that David is "naked to everyone, but invisible to himself."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Christley |first1=Jaime N. |title=David Holzman's Diary |journal=Slant |date=13 June 2011 |url=https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/david-holzmans-diary |access-date=5 July 2018}}</ref>

More recent writings on ''David Holzman's Diary'' sometimes refer to how technology and culture have evolved since the 1960s, further blurring boundaries between private and public. For example, David Blakeslee writes that when he watched the film recently on the Vimeo website, he knew practically nothing about it, except that "it could be seen as a precursor of sorts to the 21st century phenomenon of YouTube vloggers who chronicle their lives to varying degrees of mundane detail, seeking to pull viewers into whatever fascinating experiences or excruciating dilemmas they think would hold their attention. Obviously, a lot has happened in the realm of personal public self-disclosure on film and video between 1967 and now."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Blakeslee |first1=David |title=David Holzmans' Diary (1967) |journal=Criterion Reflections |date=28 September 2015 |url=https://criterionreflections.blogspot.com/2015/09/david-holzmans-diary-1967-ld.html |access-date=5 July 2018}}</ref>