Elizabeth Banks says The Hunger Games is "very emotional".

The actress stars as Effie in the highly-anticipated picture - a woman who originates from The Capitol and organises the region of District 12 tributes. The film is set in the dystopian future where poor districts must select children to fight to the death on live television until only one remains.

Elizabeth is excited to see the final edit of the film, which is due for worldwide release from the end of March.

"I have not seen much of the arena, so I'm excited to see the actual Games. It's very emotional. We really become very attached to the characters, even Cato and Thresh, kind of the bad guys of the book," she told MTV News.

"We really are attached to everybody's journey, and so I'm really excited to see how that all plays out."

Elizabeth has revealed her failsafe plan for lightening the mood on set in between takes. The 38-year-old star says she relied on co-star Woody Harrelson when it came to on-set humour.

"I think whenever it's difficult, one of my favourite ways to deal with it is to joke around. We take the work seriously, but we try not to take ourselves too seriously. Woody is a great partner in crime," she revealed.

"He tells really off-colour jokes and is fantastically self-deprecating and fun to be around."

Elizabeth has revealed her favourite sequence to shoot.

She says although the Reaping scene - starring Jennifer Lawrence - was challenging, it was also very fulfilling. The Reaping is to choose who will participate in The Hunger Games, where one boy and one girl for each district is chosen.

"The Reaping is amazing. We get to see a heroine step forward and show herself for the first time and come to life, and it was a really remarkable scene to shoot. It was difficult to shoot under insane conditions, about 105 degrees the couple days we shot it. We had all these young kids there dropping like flies," she recalled.

"It was madness, and it's also the only time we spend in District 12."

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