The List of Adrian Messenger is a 1963 American mystery film directed by John Huston starring Kirk Douglas, George C. Scott, Dana Wynter, Clive Brook, Gladys Cooper and Herbert Marshall.

With his dying breath, he tells a fellow passenger, Raoul Le Borg, the key to the mystery, though his exact meaning is garbled.

The first conclusion Gethryn and Le Borg draw from Messenger’s dying words is about important information contained in his unpublished manuscript regarding his war experiences.

Almost by accident, Messenger’s final clue falls into place; it is revealed that the Canadian stands in line to an inheritance of the Bruttenholms (pronounced "Brooms"), Jocelyn’s family of landed gentry, who avidly engage in fox hunting.

In an attempt to divert Brougham, Gethryn informs him of his investigation of Messenger’s list, calculating to set himself up as George's next victim.

That night, Brougham, who leaves for phoney meeting in London, sabotages the next morning’s hunt by laying a drag over the fields.

He marks a blind spot behind a high wall, and positions a hay tedder where Gethryn (who has the honor of leading the hunt) will be impaled upon its lethal tines.

[2] The List of Adrian Messenger is a relatively modern Golden Age type of mystery with an additional gimmick that was featured prominently in its advertising.

A number of famous Hollywood actors were advertised to appear in the film heavily disguised in make-up designed by John Chambers: Tony Curtis, Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra, and Robert Mitchum.

Curtis is revealed to have portrayed a street organ player; Lancaster removes the disguise of a female fox-hunt protester; Sinatra doffs the make-up of a gypsy horse-trader; Mitchum removes his disguise as the victim Slattery; and Douglas sheds one of his make-ups at the close of a montage of several of the killer’s personas.