AI have someone who wants a hunger games themed cake. I was wanting to use the quote "may the odds be forever in your favor" and a mocking jay but am I allowed? could i do the mockingjay pin or do I need to just do the bird in a completely different position? This is the first movie themed cake I'm doing so I'm not sure about any of this copyright stuff.

Anything that is copyrighted is not supposed to be used without permission of the person or entity holding such rights.  Or should I say "written permission"

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Well then I guess my question becomes, are those things copyrighted? I know movie titles are but a quote and object from the movie?

AMockingjay is both the name of the book and an original creation by the author, so I would steer clear of using it without permission.

Whether or not the quote itself is sufficiently original to be copyrightable is a little hazier. If you wanted to err on the side of caution I would avoid it as well and look for licensed figures instead.

http://www.guidethroughthelegaljungleblog.com/2008/07/staying-legal-when-using-quotes.html

This site talks about copyrights on quotes. And not to nitpick, but it is "May the odds be ever in your favor" not forever. 

How does one get permission to make cakes such as these? It is a difficult process?

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More info: http://jasonkraftblog.wordpress.com/2013/05/21/copyright-law-and-cake-decorating/

AMany will disagree with me on this, and I may be taking a risk, but I feel like its not going to be an issue unless the cake is extremely high profile. If you aren't on cake boss, or making the cake for a group of lawyers, I'm pretty sure you aren't getting sued for a little girls birthday cake.... Just my personal view, though.....

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If an infringing cake gets posted publicly online along with a description (e.g. "Hunger Games Cake") it would be trivial for the copyright owner to find it and track down where it came from. To mitigate the risk you would need to make sure no one posts a picture of the cake online.