Problems using perl's Git.pm module

Hello folks,

I am trying to use perl's Git.pm module, but for some reason, it keeps
bailing out:

  jw@raven:~/testrepos> git st
  # On branch master
  nothing to commit (working directory clean)
  
  jw@raven:~/testrepos> ./test.pl
  # On branch master
  nothing to commit (working directory clean)
  status failed w/ code 1 at ./test.pl line 9
  
  jw@raven:~/testrepos> cat test.pl
  #! /usr/bin/perl
  
  use strict;
  use warnings;
  use Git;
  
  my $repo = Git->repository (Directory => '.');
  git_cmd_try { $repo->command_noisy('status') }
                       '%s failed w/ code %d';
  
  print "Never reach this line\n";
  
  jw@raven:~/testrepos> 

Any ideas why the status command keeps bailing out on an entire clean
repository?