although rob_au and thinker have provided valid responses, i prefer to use a subroutine and stick it in a utility module. besides providing reusability, it does not pollute your namespace with filehandle names. here's a sample from my Utl module:

package Utl;
require 5.006_001;
use strict;
use warnings;

## a library of categorized utilities and functions

our $VERSION = 0.03;

our %slurp = (
    ## slurp a file to a scalar
    ##   pass filename (as scalar)
    ##   returns contents of file (scalar context)
    to_scalar => sub{ local( *ARGV, $/ ); @ARGV = @_; <> },

    ## slurp one or more files to an array
    ##   pass filename(s) (as scalar)
    ##   returns contents of file(s) (list context)
    ##   returns number of lines (scalar context)
    to_array => sub{ local *ARGV; @ARGV = @_; <> },
);

### more utilities follow...
[download]

you'd use it like so:

my $file = $Utl::slurp{to_scalar}->( $filename );

## or for an array...

my @file = $Utl::slurp{to_array}->( $filename );
[download]

use it in good health.

~Particle *accelerates*