Newb w/ a simple question

Just got my first mopar yesterday. 318 poly in a '66 belvedere II. Don't know too much about it as it was a wife selling it while her husband was away. All she told me was that it had low compression in two cylinders. It seems the motor is rebuilt as I found a bunch of old gaskets and some new ones in the trunk. It doesn't seem to be running on the front two cylinders on the passenger side. I checked to make sure the firing order was correct and it seems to be good (out of my chiltons) I'm thinking I need to take off the head, but want to check and make sure there isn't anything I need to know before doing this. I've never worked on mopars before and don't want to mess it up too much. BTW, it smokes a little bit, but doesn't see like its burning oil so I'm thinking maybe the valves aren't closing right? Thanks for the help.
Author: merkfalc