is there a faster "file" command?

Hi there, I am reading a remote plain text file from another server via the file command: $str = file ("http:/xxxxx"); This is a feed so there is no other way then reading it remote. Now this reading takes up between 0.5 and 1.0 s which is far to slow. The whole other process on the site takes only 0.1 s and I would like to keep it inside this area of 0.1 - 0.2 s Is there a faster way to read a remote txt file than with file() ? If not, is there a way in php to process this in the background and continue to display the page without the results of the file? Thank you in advance, Merlin