‘Viral Beauty’ Is Internet Culture In All Its Horror

It’s hard to know what to make of Viral Beauty from the start. At first blush, it appears to be a straightforward comedy: the first act of the film introduces a mess of a woman named Marsha Day, who posts an online dating profile requesting only the highest caliber of men. Her demands that only fit, well-educated, attractive, financially stable men apply are in obvious contrast to her own setting from her parents’ home Staten Island where she works as a barista. Viewer response within the movie reflects our own as the audience, ranging from a laugh of indignation to a point-by-point breakdown of everything wrong with Marsha. How dare she, of all people, make requirements? From a viewer’s perspective, such audacity is enough to make someone an asshole. And to be widely perceived an asshole is one of several tipping points in internet culture. It’s that culture that Viral Beauty exemplifies, showing Marsha’s life from perspectives both inside and outside the internet. Marsha becomes a star for the wrong reasons, akin to Rebecca Black, William Hung, or Honey Boo Boo. Ridicule and cyber bullying are a form of stardom nonetheless though, so Marsha finds herself with a six-figure offer from a talent agent to hock products in her YouTube videos, and her story rollercoasters from there in an over-the-top look at internet praise, bullying, and bandwagon culture. Viewers alternate between pouring on extreme, obsessive love or bullying, dehumanizing hate, and we see celebrity culture in…