one (or multiple) simple blocks are sufficient

{
  my $var;

  #... maincode ...

}

sub function1 {
  # can't access $var
}
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Sure, blocks would be sufficient, I totally agree. But if you really want to mimic the C/C++ behavior (I am not really convinced by the idea, but let's assume you want to do it for the sake of argument), then you could have something like this:

use strict;
use warnings;

main();

sub main {
     my $var1 = "foo";
     my $var2 = "bar";
     my $return_val = process_data ($var1, $var2);
     # ...
}
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then all your variables are truly "local" (I really mean lexically scoped). But I think that Perl offers better alternatives; trying to write C code in Perl is probably not a very good idea. I was only saying that it can be done if you really want to.

But if you really want to mimic the C/C++ behavior (I am not really convinced by the idea, but let's assume you want to do it for the sake of argument), .... trying to write C code in Perl is probably not a very good idea

Perl lets you get away with a lot , but most noobs won't understand it, so if you're going to emulate something until you learn what's what, its good to emulate

Main( @ARGV );
exit( 0 );
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After you learn what's what, you'll know why you're emulating good practices and continue doing it :) even if it resembles or mimics C

Just because perl allows and we can read and follow spaghetti code of the type  my $...; sub foo {} my $...; foo(); ... sub bar {} ... bar(); doesn't make it a good idea ; its down right irritating for no other reason than to be irritating; so you used cat as your editor, congratulations, now use pico to fix it :)

chromatics free book Modern Perl a loose description of how experienced and effective Perl 5 programmers work....You can learn this too. discusses this in Chapter 10 under "Handling Main"

Its also discussed in tyes template at (tye)Re: Stupid question (and see one discussion of that template at Re^2: RFC: Creating unicursal stars