I was recommended to watch director Michel Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) (written by Charlie Kauffman) for research into the dreamlike feeling I am aspiring to achieve well with this project/main film.
On an initial watch, I perceived the techniques used to be interesting and imaginative, for example, the transitioning sets within a single shot, similar to the style of film director Joe Wright's adaption of Anna Karenina (2012).
The settings which were not exactly realistic, I felt, were both like the set of Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980) and the effects shown in Christopher Nolan's Inception (2010).
Imperatively, the cinematic and visual effects techniques used provide a psychological puzzle in this case as well as an escape for their audiences.
(I may elaborate on this further...)