In recent years, there has been a growing international interest in the Ainu, the indigenous people of Japan. This article examines the films from the Ainu Stories: Contemporary Lives by the Saru River exhibition, held at Japan House London between 2023 and 2024, which promoted Ainu culture by focusing on the current lives of residents in Nibutani village, Hokkaido. It interrogates three aspects of the exhibition: First, the role of the manga and anime series Golden Kamuy, which has recently been a catalyst for the boom in Ainu culture worldwide. Second, the short films that comprise interviews with people from Nibutani who engage in activities closely related to tourism, cultural promotion, and community life. These films demonstrated that, for the selected participants, tourism is not merely the commodification of tradition but a legitimate way for cultural promotion and local development. Participants also shared a common motivation to demonstrate that Ainu culture remains alive without hiding assimilation into Japanese society. They also presented new narratives among younger generations that update indigenous identity by linking it to ecocriticism and contemporary concerns regarding the natural environment. Third, these interviews are contextualised within the history of ethnographic filmmaking in Nibutani: from Munro’s early documentaries of the 1930s to Himeda Tadayoshi and Kayano Shigeru’s documentaries in the 1970s. This article shows that the footage presented at Japan House London shifts away from earlier Ainu film representations and introduces a new strategy for promoting Ainu culture to foreign audiences by the Japanese government, highlighting Japan’s multiculturality.