[ dvd/noir ]
Dark Crimes: Film Noir Thrillers — available through Turner Classic Movies (tcm.com) — is a tidy three-fer that packages adaptations of crime fiction’s best: Raymond Chandler (The Blue Dahlia), Dashiell Hammett (The Glass Key) and Cornell Woolrich (Phantom Lady). None of the films is pantheon-grade, but they’re efficient, brutal and, in the latter case, surpassingly strange. Fans of Miller’s Crossing should tread lightly, since the Coens reused so many elements in their unofficial Hammett remake that the overlap can be jarring. —Sam Adams
[ world/drum ]
The Pandeiro Repique Duo’s repertoire is so firmly built on its two namesake drums that they’re all you’ll hear on the first disc of their self-titled debut (Tension Rod). Bernardo Aguiar (playing the pandeiro) and Gabriel Policarpo (on the repique) are young masters of pan-Brazilian styles, and drum mavens delight in their energy and complexity. Disc two layers on renowned Brazilian players for a lush, modern sound. The duo plays the 7165 Lounge in Mount Airy on Friday (Dec. 7, octobergallery.com). —Mary Armstrong
[ rock/pop ]
Philebrity editor Joey Sweeney has been making music in/about Philadelphia for about two decades. In advance of this Saturday’s show at Johnny Brenda’s (Dec. 8, johnnybrendas.com), wherein the man will play solo and with the (momentarily) reunited Barnabys and The Trouble with Sweeney, you can download Joey Sweeney Your Life Is Calling, a career-spanning greatest-hits collection at joeysweeney.bandcamp.com. My favorite Sweeney era? Probably The Trouble’s 2004 EP, Fishtown Briefcase, represented here by a catchy slice of indie rock called “Evelyn Rochman.” —Patrick Rapa
[ dvd ]
Few careers in film history have crashed as spectacularly as that of Michael Cimino, whose supremely indulgent Heaven’s Gate dealt a mortal blow to the industry’s tolerance for auteurs. The Criterion Collection’s Blu-ray, which gives Cimino’s name and the film’s title equal prominence, errs on the side of revisionist history, downplaying any reference to Cimino’s extravagance. But it’s a corrective to the vituperative contemporary reviews, which were more about the director than his movie — which, at this remove, is often glorious, sometimes bewildering and eminently worth (re)discovering. —Sam Adams
