PHP file_get_contents does not work on localhost

From the documentation for file_get_contents:

A URL can be used as a filename with this function if the fopen wrappers have been enabled. See fopen() for more details on how to specify the filename. See the Supported Protocols and Wrappers for links to information about what abilities the various wrappers have, notes on their usage, and information on any predefined variables they may provide.

Check in your php.ini so allow_url_fopen is set to on.

EDIT:

I didn't noticed that you actually could use file_get_contents locally, so now I'm thinking that this could have something to do with your firewall settings.

Also, try to set the user_agent in your php.ini if not already done.

Try this function in place of file_get_contents():

<?php

function curl_get_contents($url)
{
    $ch = curl_init();

    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, $url);

    $data = curl_exec($ch);
    curl_close($ch);

    return $data;
}

It can be used just like file_get_contents(), but uses cURL.

Install cURL on Ubuntu (or other unix-like operating system with aptitude):

sudo apt-get install php5-curl
sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

See also cURL

You need to also check in PHP.ini file

extension = php_openssl.dll

is enable or not, if not then just enable that by removing ; sign

allow_url_fopen = on

This may be a setting in your php.ini file. There is a setting for allow_url_fopen which enables/disables the ability to open remote files from php. For security reasons this is usually defaulted to disabled. You can enable it in your php.ini by adding the following line:

allow_url_fopen = 1

Again, be aware of the security concerns when using this feature.

http://php.net/manual/en/filesystem.configuration.php