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As a Portuguese (that has also lived in a few other countries in Europe) I would say that it's more that there is a range of emotions that men can express without that being frowned upon were certain things are still frowned upon if you show them openly (mainly around sadness) though for example openly showing tenderness for your partner or children is expected and even approved (unlike certain other cultures were men are expect to be distant).

Mind you, in some cultures the limits on expression of emotions or selectivity about which emotions you are expected to express is pretty high for both men and women (for example, the Dutch in general tend to refrain from expressing much emotion to strangers) and in some cases there is even such a strong expectation that you react in certain ways that it leads to people in general faking expressions of emotion (the English upper and upper middle classes are pretty big on showing the "appropriate" reaction independently of feeling it).

I would say (from contact with Americans and consuming some American media as well as having lived in England) that the expectations on what emotions people should be expressing are quite different and in England they're even very much defined by people's social class (for example, the "English Gentleman" is entirely a façade - all about what you show, not at all about what you think - and occupies the same place in terms of male behaviour expectations for traditional old-money upper class English men as the bossy slightly-angry assertive go-gotter seems to occupy in the US).

So far I generally have seen a tendency for frowning upon grown up men expressing sadness for themselves (though in some countries, not for expressing sadness in empathy with others and their pain, especially if they're close family) and have also noticed equivalent expectations on the expression of emotion by women (for example, it seems to me that middle and upper class English women have a massive weight of social expectations on them in terms of what they're expect to show to others - including the emotions they express - in lots of situations, and a lot of it is about reacting with the "appropriate" emotion in some situations even if they don't feel it)