Assigning output of include() to a variable

Hi, I've been trying to figure this thing out for 3 hours now. Lets say we have a variable $x. Now I need to assign $x with similar output that comes from an include function. For anyone who did not understand me --> Instead of the stupid include() function outputing the file contents to the browser I need it to assign it to variable x. I am pretty sure inlude() cannot do it but is there any other function similar to include() that will process the file and then assign the output to a variable. Thanks in advance SID