“Sweet dreams are made of this,” goes the iconic song, with which Lanthimos begins his movie. Then, more importantly: “Some of them want to use you. Some of them want to get used by you. Some of them want to abuse you. Some of them want to be abused.” Yup, all these things happen in “Kinds of Kindness,” a meditation on our free will and the ways we willingly forfeit it to others — in the workplace, at home, and in religion. For all these characters, something about being subjugated by someone else provides a perverse sense of comfort.

In the first segment — easily the tightest, most entertaining and impactful — our protagonist, Robert (Plemons), works for some sort of shady business run by Raymond (Dafoe), who controls everything Robert does.

And we do mean everything. What he eats, drinks, wears, where he lives with his wife — also hand-chosen for him — even what time they have sex, and whether they procreate. Raymond decides it all, and that’s fine with Robert — it even gets him cool gifts, like a smashed John McEnroe racket — until he’s asked to basically commit manslaughter.

He underperforms and is fired. Then, he becomes obsessed with getting back into his boss’ good graces, whatever it takes.

Stone appears 40 minutes into the movie, a cog in the same wheel. But she takes center stage in the next installment, as Liz, beloved wife of Daniel, a suburban cop (Plemons, with shorter and lighter hair). Liz, a scientist, has vanished during a sea voyage — she’s “traveled the world and the seven seas,” to continue with the Eurythmics lyrics.

Finally she’s rescued, and returns home to her loving husband. Loving, that is, until Daniel starts suspecting she’s not really Liz (she may also be a cannibal). She sure looks like Liz, but her shoes don’t fit. Also, she likes chocolate now and can’t remember Daniel’s favorite song. So, he starts testing her, asking her to do awful things. And for some reason, she does.

We won’t spoil any of the mini-endings, though you may find they’re not really endings anyway. (If the lack of clarity in this review is annoying you, well, welcome to this movie? Should that have been an exclamation point? We’re suddenly feeling insecure even about punctuation.) But the “whoa, what?” feeling you may have at the end of the second part can’t fester, because soon we’re in a cult, where the only liquid members can drink is sanctified by the tears of creepy leader Omi (Dafoe, who else?) and wife Aka (Chau.)