You can always test your script's syntax with perl -c like so ...

plankton@chum-bucket:~$ cat test.pl 
#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;

my $var = 'hello world';

print "$var\n";
plankton@chum-bucket:~$ perl -c test.pl 
test.pl syntax OK
plankton@chum-bucket:~$ cat test2.pl 
#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;

my $var = 'hello world';

print $var\n";
plankton@chum-bucket:~$ perl -c test2.pl 
Backslash found where operator expected at test2.pl line 7, near "$var
+\"
        (Missing operator before \?)
String found where operator expected at test2.pl line 7, at end of lin
+e
        (Missing semicolon on previous line?)
Can't find string terminator '"' anywhere before EOF at test2.pl line 
+7.
[download]

It even tells what's ... wrong most of the time. What error message do you get?