Mephisto ending explained

What happens

The Prime Minister takes Höfgen to an empty stadium and floods it with light. Alone in the glare, he is shown for what he is: a puppet whose fame belongs to the men he has served. He asks what they want from him.

The last image

Höfgen stands small and exposed in the floodlit, empty stadium, a performer with no audience and no one left to ask but his masters.

What it says

The film has argued that vanity is the handle power uses to get hold of a man. The stadium makes that literal: the actor is a pawn. Höfgen traded everything for applause and finds his freedom was never his.